Kakashi and Hanare
by Kunoichi Akane
Summary: What if Hanare, kakashi's only true love interest in the series wasn't a spy for the Jomae Village in the Hidden village of keys? What if after Kakashi found her, her family had to abandon the village and eventually end up in Konoha. Securing her a life near the one who had saved her and in the process, earn himself a place in her heart...
1. Chapter 1

What if Hanare, kakashi's only true love interest in the series wasn't a spy for the Jomae Village in the Hidden village of keys? What if after Kakashi found her, 13 years previously her village fell into a civil war and forced her family to abandon the village and eventually end up in Konoha. Securing her a life near the one who had saved her and in the process, earn himself a place forever, in her heart...

This takes place about a year and a half before team 7 starts and the anime begins.

It was early morning and the dimly lit Hokage's office did nothing to wake Hanare with mountains of paper work and files reaching the ceiling, no doubt some were older than her 20 years of existence. She wanted to do nothing better than to crawl into one of the padded chairs before the 3rd Hokage's desk and shut her tired eyes. She always did this, wake late every night and regret it every morning. Her older brother, Daisuke, ofcourse was awake ready to hear every detail of this mission. Through her lack of focus she could still rue the fact that she was stuck going on a mission with her big brother like she needed a babysitter. He was only 3 years her senior anyway. Truthfully, she knew both of them were suited for this mission and it was just coincidence that they both had not already been occupied.

"Whatever" she sighed inwardly.

She was soon to be the head of the espionage division of the ANBU Black ops, just a few months till old Yoshi retired and everyone said she had already surpassed his skills. She hadn't decided yet whether she was excited or scared at the possibility.

20 minutes into the third's briefing, *POOF!* The air swirled and amidst the white smoke a tall figure stepped out, Hanare felt her stomach lurch.

"Nice of you to join us Kakashi-kun" the hokage said without looking in his direction.

"Ah, Hokage-sama, I seemed to have lost track of time, my apologies" kakashi muttered, cupping the back of his head with his hand while the other was secured in his left pocket.

"As the briefing is essentially over, I will put the task of informing you of the fine details onto the shoulders of either of your team mates. As it is, it should be a simple A-rank to the land of clouds to retrieve a scroll we believe was stolen from Konoha nearly a decade ago. You all should know each other, by reputation at least. Hanare will be our main player in this; you both are to keep her safe till your return. As there is little intel on the Land of clouds, your espionage skills will be put to the test. Retrieve the scroll and as much information as possible... you are Dismissed!"

Hanare couldn't teleport out of there fast enough. She hit her bed with a thud and proceeded to strangle the stuffing out of her pillow.

"OH MY GOD" was her first intelligent thought. WHY kakashi and WHY now, on a mission with Daisuke of all people that might take months to complete. The Hokage should just have invited the entire village on the mission with the man she was hopelessly in love with for 13 years ! What was she going to do! She was a konoichi but just the thought of kakashi had her heart in a wild flutter, her cheeks warming under her skin and not to mention that feeling in the pants. Some things were just impossible no matter how many years of pain staking training you had to your name.

Her door swinging open snapped her back to reality. Daisuke's head dipped into her room to announce that it was time to leave and had Hanare throwing a kunai at her brother's short, dark locks.

" I'm coming and I told you to knock, idiot!" she shouted.

Hanare hastily crammed some clothes, weapons and other essentials into her standard backpack, stocked up her shuriken pouches and smoothed out her waist long, slightly wavy hair the exact colour as her brother's. If she was going on a mission with kakashi she might as well TRY to look like a girl.

Within moments she was at the village gates and Daisuke, kakashi and herself set out. Daisuke and kakashi were deep into conversation within minutes and Hanare took the opportunity to steel glances at kakashi. He really had changed alot since then. She remembered when she had first met him. She was 7 and had still belonged to the Village of the hidden Key. At first she was scared, being lost outside the village and running into a shinobi of a rival land, even if he seemed so small and dangly, his hair a poofy silver cloud, bigger than his head. He couldn't have been older than 12 and yet he was already a chunin and on a solo mission. He picked her up on his back and was carrying her back home when she rather dramatically burst out crying that she hated her life and that even though she had tonnes of family around, she always felt lonely. Like no one really cared or expected anything from her. She was always the useless, untalented one, that's why she ran away. Kakashi had wiped her tears and given her hope then, a connection that she felt bonded them together by a golden thread that reached to the heavens made of clouds and happiness.

Was this some kind of sign being paired with kakashi after all these years on a mission to the Land of Clouds or was this some universal joke destined to crush her?

By evening they were on the border of the Village of Tea, just a days ferry ride from the Land of Clouds and from there another 2 days trek to the village. Kakashi insisted on stopping for tea and some onigiri as they had been walking all day. Getting a booth at a tea shop, Hanare was disappointed as kakashi took the seat next to Daisuke leaving her across the table with only her pack as company.

"So Kakashi-san, do you really know 1000 jutsu?" she spoke up as soon as she found an opening.

His eye that wasn't covered up looking directly at her made her insides melt under his gaze.

"More or less, I've honestly lost count after all these years" Kakashi answered cooly.

"It's good the GREAT copy ninja Kakashi is on our side then" Hanare added with a small smile.

"Well if I'm not mistaken the GREAT Tigress of Konoha can put up her far share of a fight" he said, his voice slightly challenging.

Hanare nodded trying to get the blush she knew was on her face under control. Daisuke, who was silent through this exchange continued to stare into the silence until he finally said, "OK, i think it's time to change into our civilian clothes before we go onto the ferry" and with that he stood up and headed to the private rooms to change.

Kakashi couldn't help but peek at her from under his long dark lashes. He vaguely remembered a day in his past, where everything seemed ok, where he met this little girl with a tear stained face and unfathomable brown eyes. His old team was still whole then and he had no idea that in the next year the war would come bringing the losses he had yet to cope with fully. Now, this small but present piece from his past was right in front of him, no longer a little girl, but a skilful konoichi and he had no inkling as to why she stirred so much emotion within him when he was so used to locking it up.

"Refill?" Kakashi offered pouring more tea from the pot into his own cup.

"Oh, yes please" Hanare, who was staring at the table muttered. Their hands brushed briefly as she handed him her empty cup which sent little electric pulses up her arm. She drank the semi-cooled liquid in one gulp and excused herself to go change, mentally kicking herself for her stupidity, not seeing kakashi gaze after her as she went.

On the ferry Hanare sat on the railing of the deck enjoying the ocean air and the fact for the first time in years her mission didn't involve long cloaks and her ANBU tiger mask. Her long midnight hair floated behind her in long tendrils reflecting a tinge of emerald in the sunlight. She had just started to relax when kakashi or rather the person kakashi had transformed into (a guy with auburn hair with a face suspiciously familiar to the 4th hokage's monument complete with shining blue eyes) walked past her and planted himself on one of the folding lounge chairs that lined the deck and ducked behind a suspicious orange book. She spun around and looked out onto the gentle waves hoping kakashi hadn't spotted her.

Not a mere 5 minutes had passed when a man walked up to Hanare, put a hand on her back and very rudely invited her back to his cabin. She was just about to knee him in his crotch and throw him over bored when transformed kakashi strolled up putting himself between Hanare and her soon to be victim.

"What were you just asking my wife?" kakashi said evenly yet loud enough to attract the attention of the entire deck, giving the other man a menacing look while simultaneously slipping his arm around Hanare's waist and pulling her towards him.

The man mumbled something indistinguishable under his breath and hurried away.

Kakashi was warm against her breeze blown skin and she noticed how perfect it felt to be pressed against his side. He smelled intoxicatingly good. Of soap and trees and the subtle sent of his own that mixed everything together perfectly.

Daisuke left his position at the refreshment bar and ushered the pair to the empty section of the deck. Hanare was glad for kakashi's still present arm around her because she felt her knees give out and wondered if kakashi felt her pulse drumming loudly in her veins.

"What the Hell was that?" Daisuke whispered fiercely.

"He was bothering her so I just lent a hand in removing him from your sister's side" kakashi reputed innocently.

Daisuke passed a hand over his face, "You do know this ferry is going to the land of Clouds? That means everyone here will be our potential neighbours, associates, leads. You can't just go around declaring that she's your wife and not expect people to think SHE'S YOUR WIFE. This changes our entire story now." And after a moment of thought he added, "this may work out, if Hana is already married then atleast she would avoid the attention of the men in the village (at this Hanare cocked one eyebrow up and shot her brother a look), we could recon without having to worry about much of an alibi or pairing you up with someone to get information out of them."

"Great plan, that's why you are our strategist" kakashi said all to eargerly, tightening his hold. Hanare felt her cheeks blaze and agreed to the new plan.

"Agreed." Daisuke said and lingered his gaze on the arm wrapped around his little sister. Awkwardly kakashi removed his arm from Hanare's slim waist and excused himself. Daisuke and Hanare watched him walk away as the trolley of refreshments wheeled passed them. One second Hanare was trying to unjumble her knot of emotions and the next she was jumping backwards trying to avoid the food and liquids of the trolley from toppling on her as the boat lurched sideways. She had just enough time to channel chakra to her feet to land on the water, but being caught off guard landed a foot deep into the shifting waves with a definite *splash*. She knelt there in the little puddle feeling 7 yrs old again when kakashi hopped off the deck and landed gracefully next to her.

"Now would be a good time for lightening to strike me down" she thought hopelessly.

Kakashi put an arm around her again and lifted her, jumping up to the edge of the boat she had just fallen off of. He looked sideways at her and said softly, "Something about this feels familiar." as they sailed through the salty air. Hanare felt her heart jump. No one but Daisuke seemed to have noticed and he was doubled over laughing.

"Oh man, that was just like our first mission, sis!" he said between gasps.

"And that is why I said I would never go on a mission with u ever again!" Hanare forced through gritted teeth and shot him a poisonous glare.

"What happened on your first mission?" kakashi asked a twinkle in his eye.

"Well, she just became a genin and on our way back to the village she decided to teach herself how to walk on water, and she had no idea what she was doing and ended up with a EVEN BIGGER SPLASH than that" he grabbed his mid section and the laughter continued. Even kakashi joined in.

Hanare punched Diasuke in the shoulder and stalked off mumbling very unlady like things to herself.


	2. Chapter 2

**I own nothing and I just hope to spread some love and a good story**

The sun was dropping from the sky, setting the voluminous puffy clouds on fire. No wonder this place was called the Land of Clouds. It was that magical time when the entire world seemed to glow the most glorious shades of orange, violet and gold. It almost made Hanare want to stop being angry at her two male companions, almost.

"How long are you going to stay mad?" transformed Kakashi inquired a few yards behind her.

"I have no idea what you're talking about" Hanare said with a pout. The beauty of the place had softened her enough to even answer him.

"Anyway... it's getting late, we should set up camp, I think over here is a good spot.'' Kakashi continued obviously defeated.

Daisuke suddenly appeared next to kakashi in a puff of smoke. During the daylight hours kakashi and Hanare had been travelling alone together while Daisuke tailed them in the shadows.

"So she's still mad?" Daisuke more stated than asked.

Kakashi just made a 'Hmmm' sound in response.

"Don't worry, she'll get over it soon" Daisuke assured.

Hanare was busy finding a comfortable tree to lean against and pulled out an orange bound book from her pack and balanced it open on her knees. Kakashi was dumfounded, under his mask his jaw hung loose and he forgot how to think for a second. He dove towards Hanare stopping with his head mere centimetres from the book in question.

Just as his hopes were sailing as high as the clouds in the sky he caught what the book really was. _The Samurai's Garden _was printed boldly in black ink on the cover. A classic. His head dropped and he felt himself deflate. He thought he finally found someone who enjoyed the _Icha Icha_ series along with him, someone who understood, but it was a false alarm. He looked up to see Hanare with her thighs firmly pressed against her chest, looking confused if not scared down at him.

"Oh...ahhh... sorry" kakashi chuckled, "I thought that that was another book"

"No...Problem..." Hanare replied nervously as kakashi stood up.

All three of them started to set up camp when Daisuke said, "Oh I forgot, there's a little stream not to far that way. It's probably coming from one of the mountains by the village."

"Later." Hanare said holding a towel and making her way in the direction her brother was pointing.

"We're not done setting up!" Daisuke yelled as she vanished into the trees.

Ok Hanare felt bad leaving the two of them with all the work but she planned to milk the 'being furious thing' one more time. So after a little while and alot of scrubbing and soaking and downright playing in the water, manipulating it with her water type chakra she strolled back to camp.

Kakashi's head snapped up as she arrived.

"FINALLY" Daisuke complained. "I was just about to come looking for you."

"Sorry, I lost track of time" she replied, not an apologetic note in her voice.

Hanare sat on a log on the opposite side of the ground and started to brush out her tangled dripping hair near the gentle camp fire. Kakashi glanced at her from behind his book. She really is beautiful. He knew she would be beautiful even back then, he admitted to himself. He was trying to convince himself since the tea house that obviously he would want to be protective of her. He had met her back when she needed protecting and all this time having her right in front of him made him think back to that little girl. That was all.

Even through all the 'convincing' he couldn't take his eyes off her. Her silky hair and impossibly long eye lashes. She did have stunning eyes, mysterious yet inviting. Her smooth skin that was covered by the long slitted lilac skirt and lemon cropped kimono style top that she wore. He thought that if he could place his hand on her face his fingers would slightly sink into her soft cheek.

"Kakashi...hey...KAKASHI" Daisuke threw a pebble which bounced off the orange book he was holding.

"Huh?" Kakashi said alarmed.

"You need to work on your covertness, I know your not really reading" Daisuke said with a sly grin and continued accusingly, "Were you checking out my sister?"

"Nhh, No" kakashi choked out, "I was just"

"cuz its ok if you were, just remember I'm tailing you two" Daisuke interrupted.

"What!?" kakashi croaked out, honestly shocked.

"I know alot of guys like her and I see them looking at her more than she knows, so far she has stayed away from everyone but something about you two is different. I know you are a good man that would take care of her and I think she does to." Daisuke finished.

After what seemed like forever kakashi finally said rather weakly, "I never said i liked her"

Daisuke shrugged, " OK, whatever" and chuckled away.

The trio soon retired, planning to make an early start in the morning. It felt like hours passed and Hanare tossed and turned, replaying the boat incident over and over in her mind. His arm around her, pulling her close, the word "wife". She had used every ounce of her strength to be mad at kakashi. He had laughed at her and shattered her heart... right after pumping it full of hope when he jumped into the water to get her. Even after all that she still couldn't help the butterflies in her stomach. She lay on her back counting the stars when she sensed someone. She automatically reached for her kunai and held her breath when she saw, in the light the dying embers gave off, kakashi now completely looking like himself again jump into the trees that surrounded them.

"where is he going?" Hanare thought, "well since i'm awake" she jumped up and tiptoed around her brother till she reached the very tree kakashi had jumped up on. It was easy to follow him, probably because of her espionage skills or the fact that he didn't think anyone would be around at this hour. She tempered her chakra flow to a minimum and took light, silent steps. Only when he stopped she realised he had made the full circle and ended up at the stream. Pressing herself against the tree whose branch she stood on she got a perfect view of kakashi. He was illuminated by moonlight, giving him an almost angelic glow. His headband was already off when Hanare arrived so she wasn't prepared when he pulled off his navy tee shirt he had been wearing as the redheaded, blue eyed transformed kakashi. Hanare gasped.

She saw kakashi tense up and turn his head slightly so his ear was facing her direction. She froze, not daring to breathe. A few seconds passed and he relaxed, and so did Hanare. She knew he would be fit, she heard stories of his fierceness in battle and come on, you dont become a famed ninja without having some muscle but kakashi was...perfect. He wasn't bulky but his slim body was wrapped in hard muscle. His biceps were toned and powerful and muscular shoulders strong. Hanare noticed about a dozen faded scars all over his upper body and immediately recognised the body of an experienced shinobi, one that could wear his scars as feats of victory.

She was trying to count his abs when he pulled off his mask. At first, she didn't notice, too captivated by his mid section and then she found herself staring wide eyed at his face. His actual face, right there in front of her. She couldn't think of the number of times she had imagined it. As it turned out she wasn't far from the real thing. His lips weren't completely full but they were slightly pouty and they made Hanare smile slightly without realizing it. The scar over his closed Sharingan reached from just above his silver eyebrow almost to the level of those lips which were nearly the colour of his skin, just a bit of pink mixed in. And his nose was...cute... that was only way she could really describe it.

Basically he was gorgeous.

Kakashi stooped down and splashed the crystal water onto his face and hair. His usual messy froof of hair actually slumped down around his face, especially on the left side as glittering droplets of water spilled off. Hanare couldn't help comparing him to a particularly fluffy puppy at bath time. He sat there for a few moments before reclining so that he was laying on his back with his head on his palms. He looked up at the night sky and seemed deep in thought. Hanare felt herself relax as she took him in. His hair, his body, his face then combining that with his smell and touch she had memorised from before, she felt the butterflies take flight in her stomach. "So what if this was a one sided love on my part" she thought looking up at the sky, "it feels damn good!"

Her attention went back to kakashi just as he stood up and reached for the waistband of his pants.

She sighed inwardly. "If I was meant to see this, I dont want it to be like this, I've seen enough" she smiled "for now anyway" and took of the way she came.

One thing she was sure of now, she couldn't stay mad at kakashi.


	3. Chapter 3

**Thanks for the comments and favourites! I hope you guys enjoy the next few chapters. And later on some will be rated M, just saying...**

How did things end up like this?

Hanare out of breath, struggling to avoid the attacks of the Cloud's shinobi. Clearly outnumbered and backed into a corner, Kakashi and Daisuke on either side of her, both of them panting with open wounds dripping their life blood onto the slick stone floor of the underground cellar. She had already sealed dozens of classified documents into a single piece of parchment but the 5 foot behemoth of a scroll was still held in Daisuke's bloody arms. The scroll, their true mission, the only thing that had been necessary to bring back to Konoha was not safe yet. She did NOT fail missions.

"Hey Hatake!" Hanare called above the clash of metal, "wana see why I'm called the Tigress of the Hidden Leaf!" her voice shook with power and she slammed her bleeding palm onto the ground.

**2 Weeks Earlier**

Hanare rolled her eyes, if she had to go through yet another security check just to get passed the village gates she was going to throw herself off the damn mountain. She looked over to where transformed kakashi had just finished his clearance and was putting his disgusting book back into his jacket. She had to give him his props, he slipped by not even looking like himself and none of the ninja on guard noticed.

Kakashi looked over at her and raised his hand in a mock wave. Hanare smiled back at him. The last day they had spent travelling together was fantastic. It turned out that kakashi was pretty well read. He had a copy of every book Hanare had ever read and a few she never even heard of. Their common love of literature had provided hours of conversation.

They discussed story lines, their mutual love and hate of characters, which series they wished they could just jump into and live. He had even tried to persuade her to read his infamous books which he always had on hand, but just the description on the inside of the front cover had made her flush and stick her eyebrows up in shock. He defended them to the end, saying that it had an intellectual story line and well developed characters but what really made Hanare give in was that he said they were written by Master Jiraiya. He used his personal experiences in battle to write it. She promised to give them a chance anyway. By the time they reached the Village Hanare thought she had a pretty thorough understanding of the mind of Kakashi Hatake.

The Village Hidden in the Clouds was just that. It sat atop a single mountain peak which rose above a ringlet of white clouds. From where Kakashi and Hanare watched, it seemed as if the buildings were carved from the mountain itself with the blue and white painted Kage's building at the very top.

Hanare looked at the village wide eyed trying to take in the awesome sight.

"Hanare..." Kakashi breathed with such depth and delicacy it sounded as if he fared it would break.

Slowly she turned to face him and saw his eyes focused on her, his lips slightly parted. Though they were several feet away Hanare physically felt his eyes on her. It gave her goose bumps all over her skin. It felt as if her entire body was blushing.

She saw him then, not the red headed copy of his sensei, but the man she had been in love with since she was a little girl. Her kakashi. The 12 year old boy from the Leaf who had saved her. The teenager who had gone into the war, who she prayed would come back alive. The now 25 year old man whose face she had seen the previous night. And each had only looked at her in this moment. Looked at her with such tenderness and desire she felt her heart cleave.

They stood frozen, captivated.

Then, by pure instinct alone they both took a single step towards the other.

Kakashi blinked, shook his head as if clearing it and looked back to Hanare.

Her kakashi was gone. They were back to being shinobi on a mission. Where personal history, mutual loves and where especially warm moments did not matter.

They hiked up the mountain is silence to find that the circle of innocent clouds hid the village's defence. Guard towers, soldiers and shinobi, weaponry and the wall with its many security clearances they now found themselves going through.

Finally into the village, they met up with their correspondent. This was the man who was loyal to no one. Selling information to the highest bidder. This was how Konoha knew where their secret jutsu scroll had ended up after a decade. He set them up with their apartment and gave them their new identities, Hanare would work at the bar while kakashi was to report to the hot springs as a new attendant the next day. These were where the gossip and secrets were spread. Daisuke would slip into the village that night and disappear into the shadows to do recon without anyone knowing of his presence. Their correspondent took off as quickly as he had appeared, obviously in a rush to leave the village.

" I just dont know" Hanare whispered, "that guy was way beyond shifty, should we just go along with what he told us?"

Kakashi was opening the door to the apartment which would serve as their home for their stay in the Land of Clouds and replied, "The Hokage trusts this informant, he has been helpful before. I know you probably don't know much about him. He isn't a big fish when it comes to this kind of thing, way to low down for the ANBU intelligence to bother with him much, but the Hokage said it was too direct and irrefutable to just be ignored.

Kakashi saw the panic cross Hanare's face when he said the words, 'ANBU intelligence' and finished, " Come now, you didn't think I knew you were an ANBU, I know you are aware that I am"

Hanare gave a weak smile, "Honestly, ANBU dont even know who else are ANBU unless they are on your squad or you figure it out yourself. We don't exactly have Christmas Parties" she mumbled holding her left upper arm where her tattoo lay.

They stepped into the apartment. Saying it was small was an understatement. It was just one room with a bed and a few shelves, a small wooden table separated the bedroom from the kitchen. Thankfully the bathroom was closed off and brought the number of rooms up to 2. Obviously this was meant for one person and seeing that it would accommodate 3, they had some serious scheduling to do.

Hanare threw her bag on the undersized bed and sat down while kakashi took the lumpy looking couch.

"So what sold me out?" Kakashi asked

"What?" Hanare, who was thinking back to their moment earlier, said.

"How did you find out I was in ANBU?" Kakashi clarified, "We're not on the same squad and you're not high up enough yet to go through the files on your free time, so how did you know I was in ANBU black opps?"

"Your voice" she answered honestly, "My first day I reported you were there talking to Yoshi-taicho and I immediately recognised you, no matter how much you cover up your face and that fluffy silver hair, your voice will always give you away, your body language to thinking about it now..."

"I don't think anyone has figured me out, ever and I'm sure we never had any real conversations before so for you to be able to pick out my voice is an accomplishment" kakashi said.

Ofcourse, Hanare wasn't about to tell him of the many times she had hidden and watched him and Guy do one of their famous challenges so instead she said, "how did you know about me?"

"hmmm, let's just say I'm high enough in ANBU to go through the files on my spare time." Kakashi answered sheepishly. "and then there is the question of your hair, it's hard not to define you by"

"its black ! alot of people have black hair!" Hanare defended

"its black, and tinted with a sort of emerald green, and really long and thick and wavy sometimes" Kakashi stated as if he won.

Hanare observed that through his entire description he had not looked at her once. Had he really paid attention to her all this time so much so that he knew every fine detail of her hair ?

When she did not reply kakashi said almost self-consciously, "But that does make you wonder why Sarutobi-sama would put 2 ANBU operatives on the same mission if it is only an A-rank. Hell Daisuke has been offered positions in the ANBU every year and has turned it down. Why the need for all this?"

"No one knows about this land," Hanare said looking out their small window, " this mission is just as much about retrieving the Yuudai scroll as getting intelligence on the Cloud. It's a small nation but very secretive, like the Hidden Key. Without prior knowledge we don't know what we're walking into. Just think of the security to get in this place, they have something they need to protect."

"Impressive" Kakashi replied. He was now back to his normal appearance but still wore civilian clothes, his usual mask and his left eye was uncovered but tightly shut.

Hanare smiled, " it's weird seeing you out of Konoha's uniform, you do look alot more comfortable though." She teased.

"I'm good with anything." Kakashi shrugged, "a couple years ago when I would... well I used to look after this baby whose parents died, when I wasn't away from the village that is. And he was the most hyper-active, fussy little thing you could imagine. He spit up, burped up and you don't even want to know what other ups and outs he did on my clothes. I had to throw them all away so I just got in the habit of wearing this."

"What happened to the baby?" Hanare asked.

"Well, I stopped taking care of him since he was two, but I do check up on him from time to time. He's in the academy, as hard headed as ever, still hyper-active" Kakashi looked as if he was far away but Hanare heard the smile in his voice when he said, " he's just like his mother, but looks exactly like his father"

"The Forth's son" Hanare thought, she had no idea that kakashi had looked after him as a baby. She had seen the boy around the village, he had looked lonely, he did resemble the Forth Hokage but Hanare had no idea how he was like his mother, he was always up to trouble.

Without thinking, she repeated her initial thought, "The Forth Hokage's son"

Kakashi looked at her. "My sensei's son" he sighed and put his head in his hands. "Forgive me, I shouldn't have said anything. This topic is highly classified for his safety. It's just that... talking to you is... really easy, I haven't had anyone to talk to for a very long time"

"Our LIVES are highly classified. If we don't have each other to confide in, then what do we have. You can talk to me about anything, kakashi. You already know I like good story." She finished with an airy laugh.

Kakashi held onto her gaze, her words had touched him and the sound of her laughter, the way she said his name soothed the turmoil bubbling in his chest.

"So," Hanare said defiantly getting off the bed to join kakashi on the couch, "tell me why I agreed to read those blasphemic books of yours."

Days seemed to pass without any real intel being uncovered. Kakashi and Hanare took turns sleeping on the bed while the other would take the couch. Daisuke would be out collecting information all night and got the bed during the day. By the time she would reach back to their broken down apartment every night Kakashi would be asleep and Daisuke gone and when she awoke to head to the local Bar where she 'worked' from midday to midnight Kakashi would already be at the hot springs. She wanted to talk to kakashi some more. She missed their conversations and had a few questions about "icha icha" that she assumed only kakashi would be able to answer.

As far as she knew they had settled on being good friends with each other, and that in itself was remarkable. Kakashi Hatake was known for not letting anyone too far past the surface, anyone who wasn't Mito Guy, but even Guy wasn't warmly welcomed to the inner workings of Kakashi. He had fought for that position and Hanare was sure their friendship wasn't filled with touching heart to hearts... just a mutual understanding of one another which developed into an unspoken bond. Ok well Guy spoke it, rather loudly in fact, but it was evident that there was a deeper connection.

Still it was comforting to know she could go to bed every night with him at arms reach. Go to bed she thought, with that bed always having the lingering sent of him. It enveloped her and lulled her to sleep every night. This alternating sleeping arrangements was the best plan ever !

On their second week in the Village, Hanare was heading to the bar when she passed the flower shop. She stopped a moment at the window and admired the lovely blooms. She was always into gardening, flowering plants especially. She was wondering if a vase of flowers might brighten up the dusty, old apartment when the florist stuck her head out of the door and greeted her. Hanare complimented her on the flowers and said she had never seen such beautiful gardenias.

"oh your husband is that good looking red head working at the hot springs" the old woman said.

Hanare smiled, even the other girls at the bar had been on her case about kakashi, "yes he is, we just got married actually"

"so nice for you two young people, that boy is a good one, never looks in at the girls section, such a nice boy" the florist continued.

"well, thats why I married him" Hanare laughed, suppressing the blush on her cheeks for once.

"Why don't I give you some of these flowers you like so much, they're as pretty as you are" the florist said handing Hanare a small bouquet of the white gardenias.

Hanare had protested but ended up walking to the bar with the flowers in tow.

"My husband huh?" she said to herself. The full white flowers did remind her of 'her husband' all day. Of Kakashi's hair atleast. The strong perfume they gave off did wonders at the bar, for once she wouldn't go home smelling like alcohol, grease and cigarettes. She had even picked up some interesting information, one of the guards had gotten drunk and spilled that he had just come from the vaults under the library where he dropped off some really important documents. It was a failed attempt to pick up some girls and when that didn't work he turned his attention to Hanare. She tried to coax more out of him but he was too far gone.

"Sorry darling, I'm married" she shoved the man into a booth and slipped out of the bar.

At midnight she arrived home and put the flowers in a glass of water in the middle of the little table before collapsing on the bed.

Kakashi sneezed.

She propped herself up on her elbow to look at the ninja. No he was still asleep. But then he sneezed again before pulling his blanket over his head and falling completely back to sleep.

"I'll throw the flowers out tomorrow" Hanare thought before crashing back onto the bed and drifting to sleep.

Waking up late and then trying to wake up her brother who had fallen asleep next to her to tell him what she had found out and then rushing to work didn't give her time to remember to get rid of the flowers. Seeing as kakashi wasn't laying on the floor, going through hypervelemic shock at the moment atleast reassured that he wasn't fatally allergic to the Gardenias on the kitchen table.

Kakashi was surprisingly awake when Hanare walked through the door that night.

"Yo" he said cooly.

"Hey, nice to see you awake for a change" Hanare greeted.

"I couldn't sleep" Kakashi said eyeing the flowers.

Hanare followed his gaze, "oh, I meant to throw them out, the florist gave them to me because she was so impressed with my dedicated husband, never peeking at the girls." Hanare teased. "I heard you sneeze last night, are you allergic?"

Kakashi relaxed against the back of the couch, "not particularly, I just have allergies and those have a pretty abrasive smell"

"I think its nice, but since your suffering so much" Hanare picked up the flowers and tossed it out her 3rd story window.

"You didn't have to do that" kakashi said, secretly pleased.

"mmmh" Hanare shrugged stepping into the bathroom, "I'm gona go shower"

20 minutes later she emerged from the bathroom in her make shift pajamas.

Kakashi was still seated on the couch.

"Don't I have the couch tonight?" Hanare said drying her long hair with a towel.

"Oh yeah, I was just waiting up for you" Kakashi got up and padded to the bed.

"You were waiting up?" Hanare said with a sly grin.

"ammmm...well...we had those over bearing flowers to deal with..." he said looking at the floor. "I feel bad that you liked them and I made you throw them out so why don't you take the bed tonight?"

"Don't be ridiculous, they were just flowers and your back has to be dieing for some bed time after a night with this thing." She said kicking the couch.

"How tired are you?" Kakashi asked, his face glowing with hope.

"Not very, I slept in today and reached the bar really, really late" Hanare answered.

"Good, because do I have some stories to tell you from the bath house..." Kakashi patted the bed next to him. Hanare grabbed her pillow and sat with her legs extended infront of her on the bed, listening to his sweet voice.

As kakashi spoke, he found himself thinking. It had happened again, this feeling, this rage that burned his entire being. This jealously. He felt it on the ferry to the land of Clouds when that bastard put his hand on her. He wanted to gut that pest like a fish for touching her. And now. Seeing those flowers, only Hanare could have brought home on the table, irked him. He felt... betrayed. He didn't understand why. The thought of another man presenting her with a bouquet, talking to Hanare and making her smile like she did whenever she got worked up when she was with him.

It stabbed at him, more painful than any weapon could. He wanted to cry, he wanted to go on a rampage, most of all he needed to talk to Hana. It turned out he wasted all those emotions on nothing. No man had given her the flowers; no one had gained the affection of Hanare. Now all he had to do was figure out why it provoked him so much. So what if he had developed some feelings for her, it was only natural being a man and being in close proximity to a beautiful woman who had shared many of the same likes as he did. He had seen many beautiful women over the years, even developed a feeling or two but none of them had had such an effect on him. His usual clam demur was over taken. It usually took alot for him to get worked up, definitely more than most other shinobi, but why was Hanare the catalyst that dropped his boiling point and threatened to make him explode?

Hanare was sound asleep by the time his 3rd story was over. This was his plan, now she could have the bed and he would take the couch. He covered her gently with the soft blanket. He felt as if he needed some self prescribed punishment for over reacting and needed to make some sort of silent amends to Hana for accusing her over a simple bouquet.

He looked down at her. He found himself looking at her often when she wasn't paying attention. She looked so peaceful and delicate. So sweet, like a child. 5 years younger than himself wasn't that much, right? They were both adults. She wasn't the weeping little child he had first met anymore. What was that Daisuke had said about her realising that he was good for her? He stretched out next to her, lost in his thoughts and fell into a dream filled slumber.

Daisuke climbed through the window a few hours later, the first rays of sunlight were just peeping over the horizon. The light was still on in the apartment and the shock of seeing Hanare on the bed with Kakashi made him forget the shuriken in his leg.

"Ok all clothes still on" Daisuke thought, "I've done my part of being a big brother" He limped to the bathroom and cleaned his wound, not too deep, thats good. After bandaging it he left the bathroom and hoped over to the bed. Kakashi's hand was placed chastely over Hanare's and he noticed their legs lightly brushed. He would have pushed kakashi a few inches over but that would have awakened both of them and probably pushed the other man off the narrow bed completely.

Instead he made himself comfortable on the sofa, placing kakashi's perverted novel on the floor beside him. He could not fathom why anyone would read of their own free will. The only thing one should read would be text books and that's only when necessary. He figured he had an hour or two before kakashi would be up and off to the hot springs. He replayed the night's events. Sneaking into the library and finding the way to the underground chamber was easy, he took out some guards but then the reinforcements arrived. He barely escaped. Now that he knew where the goal was, how were they going to get there and get out? It would be a bit trickier now that the village knew the enemy was around and they would definitely increase security now.

As he assumed Kakashi was up within the few hours. He awoke and noticed his hand on Hana's but didn't remove it. At first kakashi looked happy, his exposed cheeks even lightly touched with pink. Then something crossed his face. As far as Daisuke could tell it was shock? No sorrow? Maybe regret? What ever it was made him slowly retract his hand.

"Morning" Daisuke trumpeted.

Kakashi froze and Hanare jumped up suddenly. Kakashi was still next to Hanare on the bed with his hand lightly brushing her fingertips. They pulled away looking from each other to Daisuke.

"Anyway" Daisuke tiptoed around the obvious elephant in the room. "we have business to discuss"

Throughout their entire strategy meeting kakashi and Hanare didn't look at each other once. The tension was still present when they met up under the cover of darkness that night. Hanare used her genjutsu to distract the guards roaming the library and kakashi and Daisuke took out those on their way to the vault. It wasn't as easy as they had expected with a team effort, Daisuke's leg injury had opened back up and kakashi was sporting a rip down the length of the arm of his shirt and a gash to his right palm where he had stopped a sword from coming down on his head. Hanare rummaged through the piles of information, sealing them as fast as she decided they were useful. She tried to ignore the fact that she was missing a good 2 inches from her hair, where shuriken had sliced it off. Apparently they liked shuriken in this country.

Just as she found the Yuudai scroll she felt it before kakashi had time to say, "Guys, incoming... and alot of them"

Hanare didn't know how many shinobi she had taken out, she saw kakashi cut down countless with his chidori and Daisuke with his fire stars jutsu. The air in the underground cellar was becoming hot and stifling and the limited room prevented them from using their ninjutsu at full strength. This added with them passing the gigantic scroll between them, left one of them vulnerable at every pass. Enemy ninja kept pouring into the vault.

Hanare out of breath, struggling to avoid the attacks of the Cloud's shinobi. Clearly outnumbered and backed into a corner, Kakashi and Daisuke on either side of her, both of them panting with open wounds dripping their life blood onto the slick stone floor of the underground cellar. The 5 foot behemoth of a scroll was still held in Daisuke's bloody arms. The scroll, their true mission, the only thing that had been necessary to bring back to Konoha was not safe yet. She did NOT fail missions.

"Hey Hatake!" Hanare called above the clash of metal, "wana see why I'm called the Tigress of the Hidden Leaf!" her voice shook with power and she slammed her bleeding palm onto the ground.

In an instant two immense tigers materialized. Fierce and out for blood. They leapt over the Leaf ninjas snarling and dug their claws into the necks of the Cloud shinobi. The enemy retreated a few steps, just enough time for Daisuke to toss the scroll to Hanare and for her to seal it.

"AMI, SUKI!" Hanare commanded, "COME"

The two beautiful tigers rushed to Hanare's side and she leapt on one.

"We're leaving" she told her comrades and motioned them to the back of the other tigress.

The animals raced out of the cellar and the building, easily navigating through the empty streets and bounding above the village walls.

They were pursued as expected but no shinobi could keep pace with the tigers. Daisuke weaved his hand signs and took a fist full of the thick fur for balance before turning around and transforming the landscape into molten lava.

They kept riding till they had made it almost all the way to the shore line where a Konoha vessel was waiting for them. Hanare dismounted first and lead Suki to the rivulet which emptied into the ocean. Taking a towel from her pack, she dipped it into the water and wiped the massive tigress's blood stained mouth and claws. Daisuke affectionately scratched Ami while Hanare cleaned up her striped coat.

"What, never saw a tiger before kakashi?" Hanare teased.

"Yes, but I've never fought alongside one" he replied cautiously placing a hand on Ami's back.

"Don't mind him, girls, he's just had more experience with dogs" Hanare said to the pair of tigresses. She scratched both of them on their necks all the way up to their ears.

Kakashi swore the felines gave him sinister looks and he jumped backwards letting out a very un-manly sound.

"Oh play nice" Hanare said very motherly.

"Don't worry, they didn't like me either at first, it takes a while for them to warm up to people" Daisuke said patting them "but they're just little kitties when they do"

"Thanks for getting us out of there darlings, you can go and have a good rest now" Hanare finished with one last pat. The tigresses nuzzled her sides and then vanished in two very large puffs.

Two days later the 3 of them walked out of the Hokage's office together. Finally the mission was complete.

"So...ammmm, Hana, I was thinking maybe we could train or...something...together sometime" Kakashi said staring at the tree to his immediate right.

Hanare smiled and gushed out, "yes, I would like that"

Kakashi relaxed a micron, "ok, how about this weekend when we're both recovered?"

"Ummmmhmmmmm'' Hanare shook her head in agreement.

"As much as I like chaperoning the two of you, I'm quickly becoming the interloper" Daisuke shook kakashi's hand, "Nice working with you again Kakashi-kun, see ya at home Hanare" he yelled back before taking off.

"So, I'll see you soon" Kakashi said drawing her attention by grabbing one of her hands in his, the very hand he had covered with his own a mere 2 nights ago.

"Yes, soon. I'm looking forward to it" Hanare, whose face resembled a tomato, croaked out.

Kakashi released her hand and they said their good byes. Hanare leaving to catch up with her brother and successfully plant that kunai she had missed before they left for the mission in his head. Kakashi headed for the memorial stone, he had some thinking to do and maybe his friends there would help him with that.


	4. Chapter 4

_**Sorry this took so long... I was attempting another story...**_

"I'd think you would be over the clothes crisis by now, you've been dating the guy for what, three/four months" Haruka picked up a rainbow tie-dyed shirt eyeing it scornfully.

Hanare glared at her former team mate, "(1) It's been a month (2) Shut it (3) Give me that! I made it back when we were in the academy!" snatching the ragged shirt that was still five sizes too big to fit her slender body.

Sometimes she wondered how she had managed to put up with Haruka for all these years, she was vain and judgemental and for the life of her could never keep her mouth shut. She was also very lucky. She was one of those people that always came out on top of everything without breaking a sweat and people naturally gravitated towards her. Truly, she was not that bad, she was clever and essentially a good person. Years of being the centre of attention, always having women surrounding her or men grovelling at her feet had gotten to her. Hanare thought that everything about her was typical, the typical kind of girl raised in a respected clan, she had this typical sort of beauty, the kind you see on magazines everyday and eventually just bypass the front cover of to read the pages inside and Haruka was a typical, run of the mill jonin, the kind that would never be on the front lines but close enough for people to still worship her for.

Hanare on the other hand, would probably be behind enemy lines with one or two allies at her side, gathering information, leaking rumours and setting traps. Not as glamorous, but still a hell of alot more dangerous.

Hanare's brother chose that moment to pop his head though her bedroom door and announce that he was leaving for his mission in Suna, and seeing the piles of clothes on the bed continued, "Are you going out with Kakashi-san again? That's the third time this week"

"Will you SHUT UP, I'm not 'going out' with him. I am going to TRAIN with him" Hanare emphasized.

"Just saying, you must really like him if you give up all your free time to be with him." Daisuke droned his hands folded at the back of his head. A pillow slammed into that head with enough force to push him out of the room. "At least you're not using any pointy missiles these days" he rubbed his forehead and waved goodbye.

It was true though, after the tenth mark she had made throwing various weapons at her brothers head to chase him out of her room she decided the wall had suffered enough.

"So when is the wedding exactly?" Haruka raised a perfect eye brow at her.

"I wish I knew" Hanare answered exasperated; "I don't even think I can say we're dating, all we do on our training dates is actually train."

"Really?" Haruka retorted her voice laced with sarcasm, "All you do for HOURS, ALONE, TOGETHER, is train for HOURS, ALONE...TOGETHER?"

"Well yeah, we train and either he kicks my ass, or he lets me kick his ass and then we just talk about stuff, anything really." She felt a pang of guilt as she had conveniently forgotten to mention all the hand holding they had done during their mission.

"And nothing ever happened?" Haruka asked completely sure by now that something had happened. Ah, there is was, the reason she could stand her former team mate, Haruka could read her like a book. It was scary sometimes that Haruka understood what Hanare was thinking before she herself did. That and the fact that Haruka was extremely fun to hang out with, as long as they didn't have anything too serious to discuss.

Avoiding direct eye contact and making the excuse that she was late gave Hanare the chance to kick Haruka out without answering; this was probably counter productive in any case, avoiding eye contact and not answering a simple question was not the way to go about lieing to someone, and this came from a professional lier.

In addition, she was definitely not late, it seemed impossible to be late when Hatake Kakashi was involved and she, herself, wasn't exactly known for being on time for things so that was saying something. Their first training date he showed up an hour after the time they were supposed to meet, seriously denting Hanare's optimism as well as her ego. By the second day she had gone off wandering, assuming that he would be just as late, only to find him a short distance away at the memorial stone. He was sitting crossed leg on the ground before it deep in thought, occasionally shrugging or nodding or shaking his head at himself. Well, she talked to herself enough times to not find that too odd. But nevertheless she retreated and waited at training ground 8 where they had agreed to meet. Now, Hanare was experienced and knew to reach a half hour late and then she would only have to wait about 5 minutes before Kakashi would show up. Today, when Hanare would arrive though, she would be pleasantly be surprised that Kakashi would already be there, waiting on her.

Kakashi thought it was maddening waiting on his Hana to arrive. If this was how she felt everyday waiting on him, he would seriously have to reconsider his timing. "His Hana" God why did he have to have thoughts like that? In the past month he had changed his mind so many times he wasn't sure which course of action he was following today.

The first day had been easy enough; he was just not going to show up. Getting involved with anyone was just too troublesome and could become complicated. He knew he had a great amount of affection for her but that was as far as he would let it develop and seeing her again might rekindle some of those feelings he had successfully smothered. Looking at the names of his friends who were no longer alive reminded him that he was not the kind of person who was able to find love and keep that for the entirety of his life. It was a nice thought but the statistics that 50% of shinobi didn't live to reach middle age wasn't all that reassuring that the entirety of his life would be much longer. Hanare herself fell into that category and if either of them became too attached and that happened, it would be too painful and he admitted that he cared for her enough not to dare put her in that situation. So there it was, he would just not show up and if she ever saw him and asked he would make up and excuse and then excuse himself, simple.

Now he had the whole day to do whatever he wanted, getting back to ANBU Headquarters and doing some work there would be the ideal thing to do. But. Hanare was also an ANBU operative, one that was getting promoted in a few months time. He wondered if she knew about her promotion and then realised that this would put the two of them in very close proximity and very often at that. He then thought of their conversation a few weeks ago about the ANBU organisation and its secrets, she would know he was Head of Operations now, Head of Black Opps. He then thought of their time together, their animated conversations and the accidental night they had shared a bed. How hopeful and content he felt when he dozed off next to her and woke up to find her still there. He didn't know how wonderful it was to have someone there that he deeply cared for, for an entire blissful night together and wake up holding her soft warm hand.

He remembered the serene feeling she gave him, then the strange anger that boiled inside him at the thought of losing her. Then again, denial was calling his name.

"It's better this way" he told himself, but the hollow feeling inside him persisted. He didn't want to hurt her after all, maybe he would just go and tell her he was busy and that she was a good friend and then forget all this had ever happened and move on. She certainly didn't have any shortage of men pinning after her. His stomach sunk further and he found himself on his feet to go look for Hanare, just Hanare, not 'HIS Hana' to tell her what he just decided. Then he realised his stroll down memory lane had taken longer than expected and he was probably over an hour late, she would have left by now, no way would she still be waiting. But there she was, on training ground 8, waiting for him. Just one look at her and those feelings he had been suppressing blazed up and he heard himself apologise, saw himself fence with her and then invite her back in 2 day's time.

The next day was the hardest. At sunrise he arrived at the training ground, did a few hundred laps in the crisp dewy air to clear his head and settled in his usual spot at the memorial stone. The hole in his chest had miraculously disappeared for those few hours he had spent with Hanare and in the two days they were apart, he had never expected to feel his chest so heavy. Now that he was mere hours from seeing her again his entire body buzzed with anticipation, against the orders of his mind he might add. Just not showing up was obviously out of the question. Right, time to start acting like the genius everyone told him he was. He had already listed all the reasons not to pursue the Tigress of the Hidden Leaf, now he started to list the reasons why he should.

She was beautiful. (but beauty fades)

She was beautiful on the inside as well. (nothing to combat that one)

She was easy to talk to and he loved talking to her. (there were other people to talk to...but he wouldn't talk to other people the way he talked to her)

He would die a virgin. (nothing his first one night stand couldn't fix... no he wouldn't do that, he was, by far, more self disciplined than his sensei and had some standards which was more than his sensei's sensei did, plus he was fully content handling his 'business' himself and with Icha Icha Paradise and Icha Icha Tactics and hopefully some more sequels on the way what more could he ask for?) (Maybe some actual fulfilment instead of contentment would be nice and he could just imagine Hanare under him on his bed, her slim waist and round backside with those full breasts, doing the position on page 64..._**OkNextPoint**_...) he shook his head of that image when he realised the tingling between his legs was significantly increasing)

He was now in the middle of his twenties and the same age as his sensei when he had gotten married... and had his son _exactly_ nine months later (Kakashi never really saw himself as a father anyway) (ok maybe on that one to, the thought of some little kakashi-s and Hana-s did something strange to his heart)

She had this soothing effect on him that also made him want to be on his toes whenever she was around. (he had no idea what that was about)

She was a strong, powerful kunoichi. Her chances of survival were double that of a normal shinobi with those man eating tigers she called her "darlings" alone. Plus, with her new position as head of the ANBU intelligence she would rarely have to do any field work... wait double back to number 3... _ofcourse_ she was easy to talk to, her job requires her to weasel information out of people by any means necessary. Need to think about that point more.)

If he knew he had her to stand by and quite possibly some children of his own he would always make it to go back home to them.

He groaned and thought, "maybe children are a bit rushing into things, I'm not sure she likes me that much anyhow, let alone her feelings of wanting to reproduce with me"

He allowed his mind to wonder and pick up where he left off with his previous vision of Hanare pressed into his mattress under him.

After that he was called away on business to escort the Hokage to a meeting with the fire lord and didn't see his Hanare for two weeks. Ok twelve days and eight hours, but who was counting? All he was concerned about when he made it back to the village was seeing her. He ached to see her and once he did he could not seem to quench his desire to be near her. Maybe three days in a row were a bit obvious but he didn't care. Yesterday he had been pleasantly surprised when he reached over to place his hand under the first instalment of the Icha Icha series to explain what a 'switch hitter' meant when both his hands fell onto her's supporting the underside of the book. He played it off and didn't react but Hanare visibly flinched and glanced sideways at him for an instant. Whether due to his explanation or their contact he wasn't sure. But he sure as hell didn't move his hands away until long after his explanation was over.

When Hanare finally arrived hours later she couldn't believe what she was seeing, kakashi propped up against a shady tree, his book in his lap, completely dozed off. She had to wipe her eyes to make sure she wasn't seeing things. Firstly, kakashi was there before her, secondly he was probably there a long while seeing that he was asleep and thirdly kakashi was asleep out in the open, his guard completely down. A famed ninja did not let his guard down even in his own village so Hanare put all her ninja skills to work in approaching him. She missed sleeping at arms reach from him and took this opportunity to take his gorgeous form in. He stirred, she smiled warmly thinking that putting aside the fact that this man was a trained assassin and probably the most powerful jonin in konohagakure, he was actually extraordinarily cute. She pictured the 12 year old kakashi she had never forgotten in this situation and her smile grew larger.

Kakashi opened his eyes to see Hanare leaning over him with the most heart warming, emotion twisting, butterflies in his stomach releasing, expression on her face. Yup, today was going to be one of the days he tried to get in her pants...figuratively speaking of course.

"Morning" she chirped not moving from her position over him.

"Judging from the light, it's about mid evening actually" he said nonchalantly, he was rather impressed she had gotten this close and he didn't sense her enough to wake up.

She scrunched up her nose at him and put her hand out, he accepted it all to readily and allowed her to help him up.

"That's new" Hanare craned her head sideways to look at the tanto sheath strapped around his waist.

"I needed some extra weaponry for show on my last assignment; I didn't use one in such a long time I had almost forgotten I knew how to wield a sword."

"That's really cool, I never learnt how to fight with one, though I know how to take out an enemy with quite possibly any item in a room, including the room itself, you know average espionage skills" she tried not to sound like a toddler who was overly proud of accomplishing an everyday activity.

"I can teach you if you still want to learn, this was the first tool I learnt how to use, even before kunai and shuriken so I'm pretty qualified, and I only ever broke a blade once in my life." He boasted.

"How did you manage to do something so imperfect, oh great one" Hanare said dryly, rolling her eyes.

Kakashi paused for a moment and responded with his voice audibly softer than before, "It was a long time ago during the war, it was my clan's white chakra blade, such a shame it's lost now, anyway I got a good replacement tanto so no worries" His eye crinkled with the forced smile that was on his lips.

Hanare returned the smile though it did not reach her eyes, "I would like if you taught me" then hoping it would be of some comfort to change the subject, "But kunai are probably the best weapon anyway, I don't see how a few extra inches could make much difference"

She could tell kakashi, the pervert that he was, was smirking under that goddamned mask when she realised what had just slipped out of her mouth. She felt the blood starting to pool in her cheeks and uttered an undignified "shut up" with a pout.

What kakashi would give to be able to meet that pout with his own lips seemed endless. She was pretty adorable sometimes, and sometimes that turned him on. But to be fair and to prevent him from feeling like a paedophile, she was also incredibly sexy in an alluring sort of way that only a woman could be.

They started one of their arguments that was so far reserved for differing opinions about characters in their novels. They compared weight, balance, power, practicality, possible attack styles, and uses of the kunai versus a tanto, one of which may have been as a very abrasive back scratcher until they ran out of things to say and breath to say them with. At this point they were sitting across each other with barely any space inbetween. As their debate heated up they inched closer to each other with each point, somehow this made their arguments seem more convincing.

"This proves nothing," Hanare said realising she was on the losing side of the conversation, "how about we really prove things" she slid out a gleaming kunai from her hip pouch.

"Really?" Kakashi enquired, his head being supported by his fist, not wanting to move from his comfortable position so close to her he was forced to stare at her supple skin and bottomless brown eyes rimmed with impossibly long lashes and where every time Hanare leaned forward he got a little peek at her cleavage. That wasn't all bad either.

"Yes, Hatake, REALLY" she began spinning the kunai on her index finger before letting it fly directly at his nose. He caught it with his hand that wasn't supporting his head without moving any other part of his body.

"I'm forced to now take that as a threat on my life, can we make things a bit more interesting?" the deviousness creeping into his voice. Hanare was asking for it, whenever she addressed him as 'Hatake' she probably already had some bit of a wicked thought.

"mmm" she shrugged.

"When I win, you have to treat me to dinner" Kakashi said already tasting the food, and the somewhat date it would suggest made the corners of his mouth quirk up. Thankful for the mask to cover his expression he continued, "Maybe some curry, It's my favourite, or soba if you want to pretend to be healthy but it just doesn't taste the same without a mountain of tempura shrimp on top, I haven't had onomiyaki in a while, maybe sushi?"

"Woah... ok I like BBQ" she stated holing her finger up in the air to shush him "and that's what we will be eating if I'm forced to pay and I won't be, so WHEN I WIN, what do I get?" much to Kakashi's disappointment or maybe relief she didn't catch on to the suggested date.

"I'll buy you dinner, all the BBQ you could eat." He answered blandly.

Hanare considered for a minute and then said, "Tempting, but I WILL be defeating the Copy Ninja Kakashi here, notice I didn't say Sharingan Kakashi because you will NOT be using that today. I think I deserve a better trophy than just putting on a few pounds in one night." Ignoring him mumble something about a man-eating-tiger.

Honestly, she wasn't worried about putting on a little weight, as far as she could tell, she didn't change all that much since she was 12. She got taller, but was still relatively short compared to other girls her age, and while her body did acquire feminine curves, they were no match for Haruka's. Only after she had turned 18 did her chest bother to really full out, and while she was an average 34B on her bra size, it was her slim body that made her breast appear to be bigger in comparison. But she needed an excuse to see what else Kakashi might cough up for their little bet.

Kakashi dragged his eyes away from said body that he couldn't imagine would look bad in any form and contemplated with his index finger supporting his chin, then it struck him, "You really like your kunai huh. How do you feel about jewellery?"

Well that caught her off guard. She fished the thin black cord necklace out of the collar of her shirt and held it up to the fading light, "I'm more of an earring person, but I dont really get a chance to wear my shiny dangly collection that often. I wear this constantly though. Its like a friendship necklace, the two other girls on my original team has them too"

Kakashi reached out and passed his thumb on the little golden pendent. It was oval with a border of filigree swirls and a smooth flat stone that shone a purple-green sunk into the middle the same shape as the pendent. Hanare unconsciously held her breath as her eyes darted back and forth between Kakashi's face and his hand.

"Perfect! Ok wait right here, I'll be back in 10 minutes" he started to move passed her but she reached out and grabbed the material of his sleeve between her thumb and index finger.

"No you won't, I'll probably end up waiting here all night"

"But I was early today" Kakashi pointed out.

"and now I believe in miracles, even so, lightening doesn't strike the same place twice"

"actually..." he began but never got to finish.

"No you don't, you are not getting out of buying me my never ending BBQ bowl"

He sighed loudly, "Fine, just follow me"

They took off into the trees, Kakashi leading them to who knows where, but this provided Hanare with a good view of his broad shoulders and toned behind. About a mile away from the training ground, Kakashi dropped from the trees, followed by Hanare, she looked around wondering what the hell they were doing in this part of the village. It wasn't quite the snobbish part of town where everyone had their own compound with up to ten elaborately decorated buildings but every house here was _atleast_ twice the size of her own. They walked side by side until they reached the opposite end of the street and Kakashi turned into one of the houses to the left, easily opening the gate and letting himself in. Hanare was about to ask him what he could possibly be doing when she saw the name plate on the wall.

"**Hatake"**

She was pretty sure Kakashi was the only Hatake in the village and she was absolutely sure he lived in one of those claustrophobic apartments on the east side of Konoha. She moved her head back to the house and froze seeing kakashi regarding her deeply, half turned towards her with a gloved hand on his hip. She found at that moment a rather interesting spot on her knee high shinobi boots to stare at while her face glowed red. Something about being here with him made her more jumpy than she already was around him. Hanare passed through the gate and by the time she reached the porch kakashi had already slipped through the front door.

Judging by the dust and overgrown lawn, not to mention the bushes and trees spreading out over the low wall it was safe to say no one lived here. The paint on the house was slightly faded but no chipped areas so it was in pretty good condition. She concluded that this place must have belonged some relative of kakashi's and peeked inside the door. Aside from the layer of dust on everything and the underlying scent of dog, the place was lovely. The furniture was a bit up-scale but in that antique way that made the place homey and comfortable. She was just thinking that she could make good use of the front lawn and possibly the back, maybe some rose bushes there, and a hibiscus tree at the stairs, and a few lilies would be perfect, when kakashi appeared from the door. Instead of asking the question that she answered herself before, she peeked at him over her shoulder and stated,

"You don't live here"

Busy dusting cobwebs out of his pale hair he responded absently, "I used to"

"Used to?" Hanare echoed.

"I grew up here until I was eight... you were welcome to come inside if you wanted"

"and why only up to eight" Hanare asked.

Kakashi shifted uncomfortably, "ah, I went to live with my sensei for a while and I just never came back, Anyway, this should suffice as a trophy if you do manage to beat me" he obviously changed the subject but his voice made Hanare not want to question him further. That and the gleaming silver pendent which was now displayed in his hand. The piece of jewellery in question was about an inch in length and was the exact replica of a kunai. She picked it up slowly and examined it, it was in perfect condition with every minute detail accounted for, it was even a bit sharp and pointy at the tip. She turned it over in her hands to see that along the hilt, in delicate calligraphy the name _Hatake_ was inscribed.

Hanare's mind filled with questions, why did he have women's jewellery? Who did this belong to? How could he leave his house and all his expensive contents alone and open for any random thief to take? How expensive was this really? Would he really give it to her?

In the silence Kakashi answered one of her questions, "I believe it belonged to my mother, or maybe my father's mother, the Hatake have been shinobi for a long time, this is one of those things they just passed on from generation to generation."

"And you're willing to just bet it away?" Hanare asked him incrediculously.

"It's not really my style," he said looking up at the now completely dark sky, "besides this house is full of family junk no one has touched in years."

"I can't just take something like this, it must be worth alot, and it is you family's" Hanare defended pointing at the engraved name.

"Then don't take it, earn it." Kakashi retorted cheekily. "You have to beat me in a fair fight, your kunai against my tanto" he snatched the charm from her hand and placed in a small white jewellery box.

Hanare rolled her eyes, maybe it wasn't too late to request a katana to fight with. They stepped down the front porch and down the walk way to the gate. Hanare couldn't help looking around and imagining a little kakashi in diapers waddling around in grass, or learning how to walk or more likely how to back flip or jump 20 feet in the air. This man did graduate the academy at 7 after all. Leaving the compound she noticed something she hadn't before, the gate was locked with a seal, not a key. Well, that would certainly keep out any unwanted persons.

They hadn't taken five steps away from the gate when an ANBU messenger appeared in front of them. Hanare almost jerked back slightly, but thankfully she contained herself. The masked figure presented a scroll and kakashi and Hanare both turned to each other at the same time. Surely, they didn't have a mission together again... so who was it for?

"Hanare-san" the man muttered shifting it to her direction.

"great..." she muttered under her breath accepting the scroll.

Then the ANBU bowed his head to kakashi, nodded once to Hanare before disappearing as quickly as he had come. Hanare pressed her index and middle finger together at her lips and broke the seal on the scroll and began reading. Kakashi strained his eye to look over at her orders, he definitely had not commissioned this. Leave it to Yoshi to send his replacement on one last solo mission before he retired. He wondered if he had time to give the mission to someone else, or put himself on it.

"I have to leave tonighttttttt" Hanare whined.

Damn, that didn't give him much time to change the orders.

"Where are you going?" He asked as Hanare pulled the scroll away from his line of vision seeing him peeking.

"Tanigakure in the river country, they need some help locating a comrade and since I'm part sensory type, wahooo for me" Hanare drawled out.

Kakashi raked his memory; the only Konoha team in Tanigakure was trailing a lead on Kisame of the Akatsuki. No way was he letting her go now.

Putting on a smile he said, "So, I'm guessing no match now?"

"Mmm Mmm" she shook her head, "When I get back we can, this'll take about a week or so"

"We can still have dinner, you can spare an hour before you leave."

Hanare finally snapping out of her self pitying mood moved her eyes up at him, "I don't know..."

"Sure you can, so you meet me at the BBQ place in town, I have some business to attend to first" attempting to escape to headquarters to put himself on the mission before she left, he was grabbed by the sleeve as before and had no choice but to be pulled after a woman less than half his size into town.

They got a booth without much waiting and Hanare still grasping his sleeve, dumped him in the seat across the table from her. As she put the first cuts of beef onto the grill she caught sight of kakashi nursing his own pieces. So, he intended to eat. Now she intended not to take her eyes off his face. He had to eat and had to pull his mask down and she would see him up close this time. But just for safe measure...

"Can I see your book for a second?"

Kakashi cocked an eyebrow at her but still dug into his kunai pouch and handed over Icha Icha Tactics. Hanare flipped through the pages watching him under her eyelashes.

"I thought you said you didn't want to read the sequel?" Kakashi asked flipping over his meat.

Hanare shrugged, "You don't happen to have any more books on you?" (that you could cover your face with) she added silently.

"Nope, just that one" he picked up a strip of cooked meat from the grill with his chopsticks and dipped it into his sauce for the second time. He moved it to Hanare's mouth, "Try it"

"And if I die?" she asked flushed, was he really going to feed her?

"I promise to cover your grave with those noxious white flowers you liked so much" he said lazily.

She gave him 'a look' and then not bothering to suppress the smile on her lips, took a bite off his chopsticks. It tasted as good as she had ever had. She was about to tell him so when she saw the four other pieces of BBQ that was on his side of the grill had disappeared.

"WHA"

"So, your genin team was with Sora Beniko and that Matsuro girl right?" he took over the conversation.

The fact that someone addressed Haruka as 'that Matsuro girl' was something new. She gave up for the while on the unmasking thing.

"Yip, Sora and Haruka, Sora is over at the logistics division"

"I know, she's the one with the chibi teddy bear-ish looking mask" Kakashi mused.

Hanare laughed, "She's an interesting one, the only person who understands my weirdness sometimes."

Kakashi smiled at her as she told the story of how her best friend, Sora had chosen what her ANBU mask would be, occasionally taking a break to chew on the food Kakashi was feeding her, then how they had found their matching necklaces right after all three of them passed the chunin exam.

"It's uncommon to have three girls on one team." the first thing kakashi said when Hanare had finished.

"I guess, but we became genin right at the end of the war, the number of students in the academy was at an all time low so they basically slumped who they could together."

"Slumping seemed to have worked with two of you in ANBU and I've seen Sora in action, almost as good as you" he pointed with one chopstick.

"Well she does have an interesting Imagination her genjutsu is one of the best."

"Actually I was talking about the flying" Kakashi said as though it was painfully obvious.

"That to, its more of earth style pushing her up and when she concentrates chakra at the bottom of her feet she pushes up and off she goes" Hanare acted out the movements with her hand.

"In theory it sounds easy but even I had trouble copying it" he admitted.

"I know, I tried, I failed, maybe one day I'll try again" she laughed, "water is more my thing anyway"

"I thought cats were afraid of water?" Kakashi said wickedly.

"Nope, not tigers, they love it. Tigers are very apt swimmers" she told him matter of factly "And anyway, what about you? You had an Uchiha and that pretty medical kunoichi"

OH GOD. Hanare clapped her hand over her mouth. Why did she bring that up? She knew both of them had died years ago in battle and now only kakashi remained, she knew how kakashi had gotten his Sharingan, a heroic tale of the war spread like wildfire and even though she was not yet a genin when it had occurred, it had struck her hearing about her kakashi and his team mates. Something like that would not be easy to get over and Hanare had the suspicion that the fact that Kakashi always a wall up was due to the deaths of those so close to him. She never found out what had happened to his clan, by the time she had arrived in the village, kakashi was already the last Hatake. That must have been life changing for a boy so young, no matter how skilled his rank said he was, a boy is still a boy.

Kakashi did not respond for what seemed like a small eternity, the smile that crinkled his dark eyes smoothed over slightly but did not leave his face. Then finally he broke the silence.

"You can talk about my team with me Hana, don't look so mortified" he said cooly, reaching over and placing a hand on her stiff shoulder. "We promised we could confide in each other, right? What kind of ninja goes back on their promises?"

She sent a warm smile to him as Kakashi slid his hand off her shoulder. "OK." She said just above a whisper and then swallowing back some of her embarrassment, "What was her name, the kunoichi on your team?"

"Rin, and he Uchiha's name was Obito" his voice sounded weary but his expression unchanged.

"She healed me in the hospital when I was a kid once." Hanare bent her head to meet kakashi's lowered gaze. "A broken leg"

"The way you kicked me yesterday, she did a good job healing it" Kakashi meeting her eyes.

"Yup, usually they wouldn't bother healing something trivial as that on a little kid but Rin was really nice to me, she said she just mastered mending bones and didn't mind fixing me up"

"She was always a sucker for cute little kids" kakashi said the humour reaching his voice.

"She saved me from five months of wearing a cast, I'm forever thankful for my cute little kid self"

"You were more chubby than cute, actually" he stated teasingly.

Hanare felt as if all the breath had been sucked out of her. He had remembered this first time they met. He remembered seeing her as little girl and saving her. That had been the only time they were together for him to make such a reference about her childhood.

"Well...you weren't all that cute either" she stuttered out, "you were all skinny and your hair was bigger than your head!"

"I was 12! I wasn't supposed to be cute, with all my pre-hormonal manliness and what not." Kakashi burst out in a fit of laughter which Hanare couldn't help joining him on. They laughed until their hearts were warmed with the joy of the moment and their sides were in stitches, not caring that the entire restaurant was now blatantly staring at them. Hanare wiped her eyes which were starting to fill with laughter induced tears and she caught sight of the clock mounted on the wall above their heads.

"That's the time! I'm late, I still need to get home and suit up" she told kakashi nervously.

"Relax, I'm always late and I get away with it" Kakashi assured.

"Because half the village is afraid of you" she informed him.

"I thought it was more due to my charisma or excellent lexicon" He replied wryly.

"Like anyone really falls for your false innocence and horrible excuses" (actually most people bought into it but she wasn't about to tell him that)

"You'd be surprised"

Hanare rolled her brown eyes at him for what seemed to be the hundredth time that day and getting up said, "I'll see you when I get back, and then we can have our match" she added with a smile.

Then kakashi was infront of her. Damn he was fast. He was so close she smelt that exhilarating scent that was uniquely kakashi and felt the warmth of his body through his clothes. It was as perfect as she remembered. He towered over her so that her head only came up to kakashi's chin and she was still staring at his chest when she heard him say into her hair,

"Hold onto this until you can really earn it" He slipped the little white box into her hands.

"But-"

"No butts, I fully intent to win it back during our match, just keep it as...collateral till then"

A smile broke out across Hanare's face and she shook her head from side to side, "Alright kakashi"

"You better get going, there's only two operatives on that team, I'm sure they're anxious to get their partner back"

"I'll see you soon" Hanare beamed up at him, slightly pink, before running out of the shop and then to her house to leave for Tanigakure.

As he watched Hanare leave kakashi thought, "I hope it's sooner than you think"

_**So as a side note:**_

_**Hanare means little flower**_

_**Daisuke(Hana'a brother) means helper**_

_**Ami and Suki(Hana's tigresses) mean love and friendship**_

_**Sora Beniko means blue sky, vermillion child ( I like the paradox)**_


	5. Chapter 5

The Land of Rivers was southwest of Konoha. It separated the Wind Country from the Fire country and so, there were bound to be dozens of ninja passing through. Hanare had to be careful. "Stay hidden, stay silent" she repeated to herself.

Those were the words that ended each and every ANBU mission scroll. Hanare paused on her way to leaping through the thinning tree branches and sagged against the trunk. The night was bitterly cold, she was grateful for the long black cloak that surrounded her and the tiger shaped mask that protected her face from the frosty winds. She had been travelling alone for hours and assumed the sun would rise soon. That was good, she would make it to the border before sunrise, then she had the task of finding either one of her comrades. The one that was kidnapped would be her first choice but if her intuition was right, it was best to convene with Anko first.

The problem was, after having Kakashi feed her so much BBQ she was still feeling the after effects of having her body absorb all that meat. He really fed her... It was cutest gesture anyone had ever done for her. Hanare slipped a hand on her hip pouch feeling the little box inside. Deciding to bring it along was a complicated decision. She didn't want to take the chance and lose it but Kakashi had told her to hold onto it and having a piece of him with her made that little ball of happiness in the pit of her stomach throb with delight.

"Not the time" Hanare chided herself, shaking the smile off her face.

She took off once more into the night, regaining her momentum. Her thoughts slipped back to the man she hoped was in her life. He had shared his memories with her, something she had decided to not bring up because of having no idea how to deal with that subject matter. But apparently, she did not have to deal with it, kakashi was open and willing to tell her. That meant he trusted her with his past. A trust like that meant something great in the ninja world. The world they were a part of, filled with secrets and lies, only those most significant in one's life were privileged to know the truth. Hanare was now one of those in the eyes of Hatake Kakashi.

She arrived at the border still shrouded in the darkness of the night. Having to go at full speed to make up the time she lost eating had paid off; she was hours ahead of time. She was also exhausted. Ignoring the aching in her legs she pushed on, this was too important to allow herself rest again. This was the kind of mission where a shinobi was expected to run for days without resting, without eating, without being anything but in top form if an enemy should attack. Hanare had her fair share of these in the past, but this did not make them any less difficult. That's what you get for joining the darker side of Konoha's elite.

She passed farmland after farmland, only the occasional domestic animal there to drowsily wittiness the streak of black cutting through the landscape. Channelling chakra to heighten her senses she started her search. This was the cross roads where Anko had last given her position, so where was she? Hanare closed her eyes and breathed slowly, focusing on the sound waves around her. She had always had exceptional hearing and relied on it constantly to steal bits and pieces of conversations she was not meant to hear on missions. Now she heard the distant sounds of a village waking up to her left, behind her the first crows of a cockerel and nothing from the front of left. If she kept onwards she would end up in Suna and to her left a few more lazy towns, some uninhabited areas and then the ocean.

She sighed, inne Minnie miney moe wasn't going to work so now she was forced to use her chakra. Times like these she wished she was a better sensory type, she was good at avoiding people but to actually pin point someone's location was another story. Centring herself, she pulled from the air around her until... THERE!

That was easier than she thought. She should have just done that in the first place with the massive amounts of chakra to her left. That wasn't a good sign. If there was such a large amount of remnant chakra hanging around hours after a fight, there would always be injured, spent ninja in the aftermath. She had to hurry.

It took two hours and 20 miles later but she finally found Anko. She was limping and had a variety of cuts that ranged from a skinned knee to 'oh dear lord how are you still alive'. Her usual fan of hair was spilling around her dirty face and her ANBU uniform was dented and broken. Hanare teleported to her side the moment she saw her.

"About time" Anko said weakly.

"You need to heal Anko-chan, let me go after them" Hanare putting her shoulder under the purple haired jonin for support said.

Anko shook her head, "You'll be dead in one minute flat."

"So it's confirmed... Akatsuki" Hanare replied in a measured tone. No one knew the rumours or the power the Akatsuki held like the ones in the intelligence division.

"He's not exactly hard to miss, the bastard is blue with a mouth full of sharks teeth"

"Hoshigaki Kisame" Hanare stated.

"Yes and I'm going to turn him into sushi" Anko was flaming.

Hanare was uneasy with the thought of going up against an Akatsuki member by themselves. If they had to take out an S-class ninja there would be atleast a 4 man cell and then 20 others on beckon call if need be for back up. As it was now, there were two injured and one exhausted member. They didn't stand a chance. But this mission was now about retrieving their lost comrade, not engaging in battle, so maybe it wasn't all hopeless.

"I could go for some sushi, let me fix you up a bit so you'll live to do just that" Hanare pulled Anko to a stop.

"We don't have time, he could be dead by-"

"You're just slowing us down like this, plus you're in no condition to fight, without you I really will be dead in one minute flat"

Anko pulled away from Hanare defiantly, only to crumble in on herself, clutching the gash on her rib cage. Without waiting for another protest Hanare knelt beside the older woman and started bandaging every injury with enough pressure to impede the bleeding.

"Is this Poison?!" Hanare asked fearfully, holding onto the ribbons of cut flesh and oozing black liquid on Anko's shoulder.

"If you had a childhood like mine a little poison doesn't faze you" Anko perked up one corner of her mouth.

Hanare grimaced, "O...kay..."

Straight ahead the mushroom cloud appeared followed by the unmistakable sounds of battle. Without even glancing at the other they both took off. Seconds later they teleported right in the middle of the town or what it more resembled now, a battlefield.

"What the EFFF is an Iwa army doing here!" Anko sput out.

"Apparently after that, TO YOUR LEFT!" Hanare pointing to the collapsing dome of..what was that...wood? and the man keeping dozens of ninja at bay.

After stabbing three men, one in the shin and the other two in the gut Anko directed her, "Get over there, get him and retreat!"

Hanare barely heard her over the scream of the man she had just drove a kunai through the wrist of. He had charged her with a rather large tanto, but was either unskilled or just plain too slow for her. She drove to the side in a blur and reappeared to sink her weapon into his hands. Hanare thought she had probably done him a favour. With an incision like that he would never be able to use his hands accurately enough to continue being a shinobi and with his present skills, if he continued to be a shinobi he would be killed sooner rather than later.

Now, as ironic as it may seem, Hanare tried her hardest to never kill until absolutely necessary. She got away with seriously injuring or just slightly maiming the enemy most of the times. Even when doing that she left them in a condition where they would make a somewhat recovery if given the proper care. But now, being outnumbered 30 to 1 and with no sight of the Akatsuki member, she wanted to end this soon before he made his debut.

Making a beeline for the remnants of the wooden shell and the cluster of enemy ninja that surrounded it she avoided every attack and those she couldn't she plunged any available weapon into the attacker, aiming for vital points. This would be alot easier without being half blinded by her mask. Landing gracefully on a splintering slab of wood above her fellow ANBU she summoned her chakra and

"Water Style: Tearing Torrents!" Hanare yelled letting the force of the water rush out of her and onto the surrounding ninja. She jumped down and Anko appeared next to them, dripping wet. She shot Hanare a peeved look, "Next time, let me know before you turn the place into a swimming pool."

"Well, I did shout it out" Hanare countered, but her attention was fixed on their newly reunited comrade. She had never met him before but he was somewhat a legend in ANBU as the most successful member to date, that and having the abilities as the 1st Hokage made you a legend. One hand was returning to its normal appearance, before resembling a rapidly growing tree and the other was cradling a bundle of cloth that could only be one thing.

"Here, hold this" Tenzo handing over the bundle to Anko.

"Is this a-" Anko began but was interrupted by the incoming of the enemy who were starting to get back their footing.

"I should have drowned them" Hanare said exasperated through silted eyes.

Then.

"IT'S THE COPY NIN!" someone called.

"RETREAT! THEY HAVE REINFORCEMENTS!" said another.

The chaos erupted through the crowd of shinobi as a blue and silver shape zigzagged its way to the Konoha ANBU, knocking the footing away from atleast half its members.

"Yo, am I late?" Kakashi asked coolly stopping a few feet in front of them, facing the enemy with his tanto drawn.

"Right on time" Hanare answered from behind her mask.

At this point most of the Iwa ninja were retreating, those who remained were looking at kakashi nervously, debating whether to fight or flee.

"Don't be stupid." Kakashi said his voice pushing ice through everyone's veins. He turned and placed his hand on Tenzo. Hanare grabbed Anko and they teleported a few hundred feet into the forest.

Landing with a thud on the shady forest floor and finally out of danger Anko examined the bundle she was entrusted with.

"Oh, when did Anko-chan have your baby Tenzo?" Kakashi enquired.

The three shinobi slowly turned to masked man and regarded him as if he had just sprouted horns and a tail.

Even though Tenzo was bloody, most of his skin settling to a dark purple colour and Hanare guessed half of his bones fractured, he mustered enough energy to shake his hand infront of him as if he were an exceptionally cranky grandfather and the kids next door just smashed a ball through his window.

"Kakashi-sama, You know very well that, THAT IS NOT MY CHILD" Tenzo raged, his face now resembling a small volcano.

"Not mine either" Anko dismissed, handing over the now sobbing little child to Hanare.

"shhh, honey don't cry" Hanare began rocking the baby in her armoured hands. She looked up to see the woman and two men staring at her.

"Do you want him to keep screaming his head off and give away our location? And he's not mine obviously, I'm the youngest here and I'm not going to be the teen mom right now." Hanare held the baby to her shoulder and started humming.

"You" Kakashi pointed to Hanare, "are twenty, and therefore can not be a teenaged mother, even if that were to happen. And you," he pointed quickly at Tenzo, "when I taught you the strategy of allowing yourself to get caught and then escaping, you're meant to be able to escape easily, not commit suicide against some weaklings from Iwa"

"But I'm not twenty yet"

"But I was up against an Akatsuki first"

Tenzo and Hanare spoke together.

"Pardon, May you repeat that again" Kakashi said with an eerie calmness to Hanare. Somehow he found her age more interesting than his former apprentice's encounter with an S-class rouge ninja bent on destroying the world.

"I said I'm not twenty yet" Hanare repeated cautiously.

It was kakashi's turn to gawk at Hanare as if she had just grown some demonic appendages.

"What do you mean not twenty yet?!" Kakashi's eye seemed to pop out of his head.

"I'll be twenty at the end of the year, I just get accustomed to hearing everyone else move up a year before me so I got in the habit of saying I'm a year older a few months early."

Kakashi needed to build some sort of immunity to the emotions Hanare invoked onto him. Atleast, he needed to find a way to get his heart restarted and his usual relentlessly working mind thinking again. All this time he had been fantasizing over a teenager... cue the dirty old man feelings. Even if this only differed their ages by small degree further, the fact stood that she was a teenager and some things just did not get crossed. It wasn't like Hanare was not legal, that was to be over 17, and to be honest no one really cared for that law anyway.

Awkwardly averting her eyes to Tenzo, Hanare asked, "So, why do we have a baby?"

"His parents were killed when the Iwa came charging in, I was unconscious till then and when I came to I saw the house collapsing, He's the only one I could have saved. Hoshigaki Kisame was coming after me so I skewered his legs together and then he disappeared, I have not a clue what the Iwa were doing there but they just started attacking." Tenzo related. "I also don't know where he went or if he'll be back."

"I didn't hear anything about Iwa nin in this land either." Hanare confirmed.

Looking over at Anko and Tenzo's beaten up forms she handed the crying baby over to kakashi, "Here, you have experience in this area; I'm going to get our bearings and see if it's safe to leave yet."

"No I'm the least banged up, I should go and..." the baby stopped crying finding amusement in tugging at kakashi's spiky hair.

"See he likes you, now if you can start treating those two, I'm just going to poke around a bit." Hanare took off her torn black ANBU cloak and draped it over the child in kakashi's arms. She noticed that kakashi had arrived in his usual Konoha ninja uniform. Oh well, Kakashi did have a habit of walking around the village in his ANBU clothes sans ANBU mask all the time. Only he could have possibly gotten away with something so beyond regulations, this was probably nothing.

"Are you sure?" Kakashi asked.

"Yeah, I'm quieter than you, and if anyone were to show up here I'll have a hard time dealing with them and keeping those two out of trouble."

With kakashi's consent Hanare headed back the way they came on foot. She used her sensory skills to scan the area until she came upon the half destroyed little town. No sign of Iwa or the Akatsuki man. It seemed the occupants of the town were still holded up in their houses fearing another attack. Hanare padded over to the small collapsed house. This had to be that child's house. Digging through the rubble, she avoided the areas that were blood stained and found a few useful items. A roll of bandages, a large bottle of water, some clean diapers in a plastic bag and a dented tin of powdered milk. It would have to do until they decided what to with the child.

Arriving back, she found Anko and Tenzo fully bandaged and taking turns at making funny noises at the whimpering baby. Kakashi was sitting on a fork in the tree above their heads with his book on his lap.

"You all are useless." Hanare announced, throwing the supplies she collected at them and picking up the child.

"What did those mean people do to you." She held the baby up to her face, only to make him let out an ear-piercing scream.

Kakashi hoped out of his tree and landed next to her with an index finger in his ear, "What are you doing to him?"

"Oh, nee-chan is sorry." Hanare popped off her ANBU mask. "Did I scare the little sweetie"

"Do you always wear it like that?" Kakashi asked Hanare, who was revealed wearing black mask which came up to her nose. It was exactly like kakashi's.

"It's very becoming, don't you think" Hanare teased slipping the mask down her neck. "It reminds me to keep my mouth shut on these kinds of missions. Now, time for your breakfast" she nuzzled her nose into the baby's cheek.

Kakashi wished he had an excuse to make the earth open up and swallow him. First, he found out she was a teenager, then that mask, now mentioning breakfast to a baby made his eyes fall onto Hanare's chest even though that was completely out of the question, for the baby and possibly himself.

Hanare made up a bottle for the child and while he fed she relayed what she had found.

"We should carry him back to his village and see if he has any relatives or anyone willing to take him in" Tenzo suggested.

"Agreed but later, cuddly poops just fell asleep, and two of you should be resting anyway" Hanare said gently swaying the child in her arms.

"Hana's right, you should heal a bit and in the evening we'll move out" Kakashi agreed.

"Hana?" Anko perked her eye brows up at the lack of honourific and the shortening of her name.

Both Hana and Kakashi conveniently did not hear Anko and Kakashi got up to walk around the perimeter for any edible plants around. Anko shimmied up to Hanare as soon as he was out of ear shot.

"What did you do to get into the Copy nin's pants?"

"_WHAT!"_ Hanare almost dropped the baby and Tenzo dropped his jaw.

"You heard me _Hana, _I know people after him for years and he never looked twice at them, but since he got here all he did was ogle at you every 10 seconds."

"Amm...I didn't get into his pants" Hanare felt strength from her body evaporate.

"But I'm sure he wouldn't mind if you did" Anko licked her lips.

Hanare glanced at Tenzo for a shovel to dig her way out of this situation but he looked back at her with his own curiosity.

"Why don't you go ask him yourself, Anko-chan" Hanare tried sounded threatening but it was forced and pathetic.

Anko laughed and glided to the base of tree, put her hands behind her head and shut her eyes, "I just might" She snickered.

Tenzo put his hands up in surrender and lay on his back on the forest floor and slipped into unconsciousness. This left Hanare alone with her thoughts, rather wonderful thoughts, thoughts that she should not be thinking of while holding the embodiment of innocence in her arms. She wasn't sure when kakashi had returned, she glanced up to the fork in the tree above them some time later and found him standing on the branch, one hand leaning on the trunk for support. Hanare wondered how much time he spent in trees like that, it would certainly account for that hint of woody aroma that surrounded him. He glanced down to see Hanare had spotted him and flew from his spot to her.

"Ready for a hand off?" He smiled at her.

"Sure" she handed him the sleeping infant.

"Bringing back any memories?" Hanare asked warmly.

"A few, though it seems to like me more than Naruto did at first."

"Cuddly poops" she corrected.

"Huh?"

"He is not an 'it'" Hanare stated delicately, "I have christened him cuddly poops till we find out his name."

"Let's pray it's not really that, poor kid is gona get beaten up every day of his life if it was."

Hanare laughed, "Yes, because baby scarecrow is infinitely better" she reached up and patted his silver head. It was a little guilty pleasure she decided was ok to steal and it _was_ as soft and fluffy as she had imagined.

Kakashi silted his eye, "Whatever you say little flower" and returned the pat.

"By the way, what took you so long, I thought I had atleast a minute or two head start on you."

"Wouldn't you know, right after you left the BBQ place, I got commissioned by the higher ups to this exact mission." He said with his false innocence.

Hanare was pretty sure there weren't many higher up than kakashi, so either the elders thought this was far more complex than it turned out to be, or kakashi had put himself on the case. She watched him from under her lashes until he asked her what was wrong.

"Oh nothing, you look suited for that, ever thought of becoming a father in the future."

Kakashi felt his heart leap into his throat, she couldn't read minds right? Her sensei was Inoichi after all, did he teach her his jutsu and if so, he needed to come up with the most ingenious alibis he had ever spit out for all the R-rated material in his head...all the recent ones staring Hanare herself.

He cleared his throat, "Maybe in the future, I'm too young to be thinking about that now anyway." He tested the waters first.

"I guess, but it's always smart to think about things like that in the long run." Hanare shrugged.

Yes, he was safe!

They spent their time in a comfortable silence, occasionally commenting on something, or gently poking the sleeping baby to see him make adorable irritated faces at them. Anko awoke first, then 'Cuddly poops' started stirring with a whimper, realising he was in a strange place without his parents. Hanare held him close to her making soothing noises; he would have to learn how to wake up without his parents from now on. When Tenzo at last got up, Hanare was feeding the baby and three dirty diapers lay in a pile a bit too close to his head for comfort. Needless to say, Kakashi was responsible for diaper disposal.

The sky was starting to streak with orange when the team arrived back at the village. The rubble of the dilapidated house had been shifted and a few villagers were out. In full ANBU gear, with the exception of kakashi who had to hold the baby, because he was frightened of the masks, it was difficult to find a person willing to speak to them. When they finally did, they were informed that during the day, the child's parents were dug up and given a proper burial. To their disappointment, the child had no relatives in this town and no one had the means to take him in. Being refused by each and every one of this child's former neighbours made Hanare want to explode. She was just about to do that when a middle aged man informed them that the child was supposed to have some family that owned a small farm on the way to the fire country.

"He's lieing, he just wanted us to get the hell away from this place" Anko murmured.

"Anko, be a little more considerate" Kakashi said holding the baby up by the arms so that he was essentially standing.

They were at the town's cemetery, in front of the two latest additions, the child's parents. They came to pay their respects and to give the boy and his parents a last chance to be together. The Konoha shinobi had not yet decided what action to take but this seemed the right thing to do before proceeding with anything.

"She may be right though, if we don't find these elusive relatives, what are we going to do with...ammm, cuddly poops here" even Tenzo seemed to catch on to Hanare's nickname for the baby. "I'd think it not right to leave him in any random orphanage, it's partly our fault he's in this mess and he will not be accepted in Konohagakure, he's an outsider"

"Konoha accepted me" Hanare said in a small voice. Then clapping her hands together she added zealously, "Otousan and Okaasan of this baby, I promise to take care of your child until we can find a safe home for him, I apologise for the circumstances, but I will ensure he has a good life and I promise he will know where he came from and who his parents are." She reached out and passed her fingers on the wooden plank that marked their family name. –** Kishi**

"Hai" Anko knelt beside her in agreement.

"Hai" Kakashi nodded his head.

"Hai" Tenzo followed softly.

Hanare turned to each in turn and gave them a small smile, "See, you have three of the best Ninja in all of the world looking after your son, he is in good hands, literally." She finished with a small chuckle seeing kakashi still supporting him while he stood on two very wobbly legs.

"Four of the best" Kakashi glanced from the corner of his eye at her. Hanare merely smiled to the ground as her face warmed.

That night was as chilly as the previous and was impossible to make any progress with injured team mates and a tiny infant. They returned to their initial spot in the forest and Tenzo managed enough chakra to put up a wooden lean-to to shield against the wind. Cuddly poops was very fussy being cold and hungry. Anko volunteered to return to his village and get some provisions for the baby. she returned with more milk and a bag of dango.

"Did you actually pay for any of this" Tenzo asked.

Anko just shrugged and devoured another stick of the sweet dango.

"You could have swiped some blankets" Hanare nestled the child close to her chest and shivered. The already cold night was made colder by having to give up her cloak to wrap around cuddly poops.

"You can have mine Hanare-san" Tenzo offered. Hanare declined saying that he probably needed more than she did.

"So who here is least likely to roll over in their sleep and smother the kid?" Hana questioned.

"Definitely not me." Anko responded slightly embarrassed. "Might be best to have me furthest away from him."

"I'm not quite sure if I move in my sleep or not" Tenzo said.

"Neither am I" Hanare added.

"Both of you do occasionally" Kakashi informed from behind his book.

Hana looked at Tenzo and Tenzo looked at Hana and Anko looked as if she was just handed the holy grail of information.

"You have very diverse preferences, senpai" Anko squealed her hand in front of her mouth.

Kakashi glanced lazily up with a "eh?"

Tenzo once again resembled a miniature volcano; Hanare thought this was doing nothing good for his blood pressure, "It's not like that! We've had alot of missions together where we would have to sleep NEXT to each other, just like now!" Tenzo gestured to their current set up.

"Same here" Hanare added breathlessly.

The next half of the night was spent strategising and then Tenzo and Anko retired leaving Kakashi and Hanare to keep watch. Hanare had the first watch and for over an hour tried to put cuddly poops to bed. Hanare tried singing, humming, rocking and walking to no avail. Within that hour Kakashi had lifted his head up at them trice until, finally, kakashi took the baby from Hanare and within 5 minutes he was asleep.

Kakashi regarded Hanare with a cocky grin having been victorious.

"No way" Hanare whispered, sliding her back down the tree kakashi was leaning against.

"I'm just the better parent it seems"

"You have more experience and you probably feel like a daddy that's why."

"How does one feel like a daddy?"

"I don't know, probably big and strong and protective" she answered distractedly.

"I am neither big, nor strong nor protective, but if it's compared to you well..."

Hanare jabbed him in the shoulder, hard. "You're warm!" Hanare discovered. She felt the temperature of her face with the back of her hand and then placed her palm on kakashi's chest, by passing his jonnin vest and reaching the cloth of his shirt. "That's why he's more comfortable with you, I'm freezing!"

Kakashi gazed at his own chest where her hand lay, delicate and unmoving. He let the moment guide him and slipped his gloved hand over hers. Closing his eyes he just felt her touch sink into him, he felt both shivers run through him as well as the sensation of being enveloped in warmth. Turning to meet her eyes, he felt an even greater intensity than the one that had over taken him the day they had arrived in the land of clouds and he had uttered her name. He wanted her.

"You are cold" He whispered to the small frame next to him. Was he able to open his heart and soul completely to her? Was now the right opportunity and if so was he ready to impact the blow of rejection? She was just a girl after all, but her touch and her eyes made every nerve he had go unstrung.

With a forced smile Hanare recaptured her hand and the moment passed.

"You should get some rest." She said, her gaze pointed to the sleeping child in his arms, "I'll be waking you soon for your shift."

Kakashi got up quickly and took his place next to Tenzo once again, this time fitting cuddly poops snugly next to him. Hanare didn't bother to wake him, though she suspected he didn't sleep through that night as well.


	6. Chapter 6

It had been a long day and by the end of it they hadn't even made it back to the cross roads where Hanare was supposed to meet Anko initially. Anko and Tenzo were doing better but the baby had come down with a case of the sniffles making him and consequently everyone around him more irritable. It was amazing how the mood of one small creature could affect the frame of mind of four highly skilled assassins. Kakashi hadn't met Hana's eyes since the night before and the silence between them was deafening. Anko, on the other hand, had never been more lively and energetic as they made their way to Konoha.

Tenzo, the seemingly only mature one in the group, ordered that they should call it a day and mustered up enough energy to make a small one room cabin.

"Tenzo, I absolutely love you!" Hanare gushed opening the door.

Behind her Anko elbowed Kakashi and wiggled her eye brows at him. He paid her no attention and wiped cuddly poops leaking little nose.

Tenzo blushed, "It's nothing, I usually can do alot better, it should be a two story with a porch and everyone should have a room of their own."

"Remind me to request more missions with you" Hanare said, impressed.

Kakashi chose this moment to dump the fussy baby covered in mucus on Tenzo and stalk out the door. Hanare felt somewhat relieved to not have to face kakashi for a while. She mostly felt edgy, like there was an unimaginable weight on her chest as she kept waiting for kakashi to walk through the door. As a spy, she was used to collecting bits and pieces of intel and putting them together in a way that made sense. She was also accustomed to reading complete strangers body language and tone of voice to a tee. But Kakashi was completely unreadable when he chose to be. The man gave nothing away. This drove Hanare crazy not being able to figure someone out and even more so that it was about kakashi. One moment he was slipping his palms under hers to read an erotic book together and the next he looked at her completely mortified when she simply touched his chest.

"It's ok if he touches me, but I can't touch him is it!" Hanare thought furiously and then out loud, "HMP!"

"What's your problem?" Anko asked, now holding the hushed baby.

"Nothing" Hanare replied sinking even further into the darkness of the corner of the cabin she occupied.

"Anko-chan, you didn't give him anything right?" Tenzo suspended above them enquired, "He's never this quiet while he's awake."

"I wouldn't drug a child." She responded all too gravely. Whatever she meant Tenzo immediately caught on and answered with his own grave expression. Being in ANBU intelligence did come in handy at times like this, Hanare knew from the files that both of them were experimented on as children by Orochimaru. She just shrugged inwardly, she was not in the mood to deal with anything so she just settled into the rolling stillness that took over the cabin for the next few hours.

The silence was finally broken a few hours to midnight, when cuddly poops refused to drink his milk and started to make the most heartbreaking sobs into Tenzo's shoulder. This snapped Hanare out of her mood and the three ninja took turns to comfort the baby.

"He's just feeling sick" Hanare guessed slowly twirling around the cabin with cuddly poops in tow.

"If he would just sleep he might feel better and tomorrow we'll find his family and they'll take better care of him." Anko assured.

Clearly, either Tenzo couldn't stand the baby's suffering or his own anymore when he marched to the door. "OH FOR THE LOVE OF-" he ground out smacking the door open and pulling Kakashi into the cabin by the stiff collar of his uniform. "YOU HAVE BEEN OUT THERE FOR AN HOUR, CAN YOU JUST TAKE CUDDLY POOPS AND PUT HIM TO SLEEP ALREADY"

Hanare was surprised by two things, Tenzo had found an angry way to say the name 'cuddly poops' and that Kakashi was out there for so long and she didn't notice when he got back. Without even a glance up at him, she handed over the child and was equally as shocked to feel that though he was outside in the freezing temperatures, his hands were still warm. She retreated next to Tenzo and began a quiet conversation about the workings of his wood jutsu while inadvertently finding an excuse not to look up at the white haired jonin. She was beginning to really like Tenzo. Never before did she think it was possible to have a close platonic relationship with someone from the opposite sex. Sure she had numerous acquaintances and allies but no close 'guy friends'.

In 13 minutes exactly, cuddly poops was lulled to sleep and tucked carefully into Kakashi's sleeping bag along with kakashi himself. He said a simple, "Wake me up for my shift" to no one in particular and settled into his bed on the cabin floor.

"Well he's in a bad mood" Tenzo stated under his breath.

"Really? Hadn't noticed." Hanare added, still standing next to him.

Tenzo looked down at her from the corner of his eyes and after a moment of deliberation, "Hanare-san, I have been around kakashi-senpai for a long time and I have never seen him like that. I know what he's like when he's happy, sad, disappointed even angry but I have never seen him...uh... like this. What really happened last night when we were asleep?"

Hanare chewed the inside of her cheek, not sure how to respond.

"I know!" Anko appeared so suddenly next to Hanare that she jerked back knocking into Tenzo. "You two did it and it sucked, that's why. It wasn't even good enough to wake us up and now you can't even look at each other because of the disappointment"

It was a good thing she half landed on Tenzo, he was close enough to restrain her when Hanare lunged towards Anko to strangle her. "That definitely did NOT happen!" Hanare grated out, trying her hardest not to yell and wake up the baby.

"Alright, alright sorry" Anko giggled out, "You know this is the second time since you arrived that you attempted to injure me. First you almost drown me and now this" she pointed at the centimeter long pink line that Hanare's fingernail had made along her collar bone. "I'll take first watch as I may be at risk from dangers outside as well as inside here"

Tenzo picked up a still struggling Hanare and placed her gently next to kakashi. God she hated being moved against her will, but being small seemed like the invitation for everyone to just pick her up and move her to wherever seemed more convenient.

While the wooden walls kept everyone warm, the place was just big enough to fit four bodies along its width, with everyone in their sleeping bags. The last thing Hanare wanted now was more contact with Kakashi but Tenzo refused to let her go on the other side of him, as at some point, Anko would be there seeing that Kakashi had pressed himself up against the right wall of the cabin. The only option she was left with was to sleep at everyone's feet and that was quickly rejected. Tenzo told her that he would take the other shift after Anko, then would be her turn and Kakashi for last as he didn't want to disturb cuddly poops and risk waking him up.

With one final death stare to Anko, Hanare chose to sleep facing her brown haired team mate. She soon realised that sleep would not come and with Tenzo softly snoring, she watched him with hooded eyes. His hair was slightly spikey, though it couldn't hold a candle to kakashi's. Hanare assumed he was probably handsome, with those mahogany locks and strong features. He had a bigger build than kakashi but was by no means clunky, if anything he had a more manly stature while kakashi was slender and lanky. Surprisingly, and unlike kakashi, he did not smell like the trees that surrounded the village. His was more of the earthly warmth that freshly tilled soil, just begging to be planted had. It was nice. Hanare felt sorry for him having to sleep in his large Hitai-ate. It wasn't like the forehead protectors everyone usually wore. His was really old school, like the ones shinobi used to wear a decade ago, it was metal and came all the way down his face to cover his cheeks.

Situations like these didn't allow for one to take off their heavier pieces of clothing to sleep. They had to be ready to move out at moments notice. Just having the luxury to sleep every night was a thing of beauty on ANBU missions. Hanare wondered how kakashi slept when not on missions. When they were together in the land of cloud he would have his mask on and his head band which covered his Sharingan off. He would even pull his blanket all the way over his head and curl up on his side sometimes. It was really adorable. He would look so soft and smoothe and warm and huggable. She suddenly had the urge to scoot closer to the body to her right.

"No" she willed herself, "You are NOT doing that"

After a few hundred black sheep later (She started off counting white but they kept growing Konoha head bands over one eye) she finally welcomed sleep. It was a blissful, dreamless slumber that relaxed every inch of her tensed body. That is, until Tenzo got up next to her to assume his guard duties and woke her up. She didn't mind. Hanare felt so rejuvenated she decided that she would cut Tenzo's shift short and let him rest up some more. At some point she had actually shifted a bit closer to Kakashi but not close enough to actually touch his back. He was like a furnace next to her, and usually that would be a good thing as she always found herself unable to make enough body heat but now in the cozy warmth of the cabin she found herself beginning to sweat. Slipping out of her sleeping bag she rolled onto her back with one hand under her head to look up at the ceiling. It was alot cooler and with Tenzo gone, roomier.

She lost track of time blankly staring at the dark ceiling. Her mind clear. It was so peaceful in the tranquillity of the night, listening to Anko and Kakashi's rhythmic breathing. She envied those animals that where nocturnal. Hanare should have been happy to be able to sleep next to kakashi at arm's length again; only she was too busy not trying to invade his personal space to remember that. Weren't they passed that phase in their relationship, even if that relationship was solely friendship? It didn't make matters well that he had started to toss and turn in every which way. Hanare shut her eyes and feigned sleep when she felt kakashi getting up besides her. When she felt the tiny warm bundle being placed on her arm, her eyes snapped open to see what the hell kakashi was doing. He sat bending over her, one hand still on cuddly poops where he had placed him up against Hanare.

"Sorry." He whispered, "It was getting crowded by me"

Hanare propped herself on her elbow and looked up at him expectantly. "About last night..."

He remained silent, but his gaze locked with hers.

With a sigh, Hanare swallowed her pride, in this circumstance, involving this man, she decided to let it all loose, she had lusted after his man for 13 years and was not about to make it into a "what might have been". She much rather be happy than dignified. Not caring if either of her other teammates were listening she started "I'm sorry about-"

"You don't have to be sorry about anything" Kakashi assured in a low voice that was even further muffled by his mask.

"But last night-"

"I was just surprised" He shrugged, "I also noticed you don't have my family's heirloom with you, I told you to keep it with you." His eyes fell onto Hanare's Cord necklace with a single gold charm dangling from it.

In response she reached into her hip pouch and brought out the little white box.

"You _Can_ wear it you know, that's what I meant by keeping it safe. The only way you would lose it, is if you somehow managed to get beheaded, and God forbid that ever happen. Especially when I'm on the mission with you." He tugged at the cord till the clasp came to the front of her neck and added the Silver kunai charm, engraved with _Hatake_ to it.

While she could think of a good dozen other ways for his charm to get lost she just clutched the pendent in her hand and fixed her eyes on his nose, unable to make eye contact with him.

"I think this is the longest you have ever gone without opening your mouth" the smile crinkling his eye.

Hanare's cheeks turned a soft pink, thankful the cabin was dark she shrugged with a "Hmm" sound.

"I'll go take over for Tenzo now, you get some sleep ok." And with one light pat on her forearm he was gone.

Hanare lay back on her sleeping bag which now contained a rather adorable, squishy, little boy. Cuddling up to him she whispered into his soft brown locks, "Promise me you will not turn out like him when you grow up."

When Tenzo made it back to his spot next to Hanare, he saw that she was awake and gently caressing the baby's cheek. She moved over to allow him to climb back into his own sleeping bag. He had questioned Kakashi moments before but that didn't yield anything except a threat to remove him from ANBU and demote him to chunin status if he kept harassing him. So, basically, kakashi was back to normal.

As of this point Tenzo had received 5 threats of that nature, absolutely none he had taken seriously. Kakashi always chose to lead with a gentle hand and laid back personality, so when he threatened anyone like that, either you were royally screwed or it was his attempt to say everything's alright now. He debated whether he should ask Hanare again, this time without the interference of the purple haired Konoichi he seemed to be eternally teamed up with. Should he mention that...no it didn't seem right...they didn't look as if either was truly conscious of their actions...they couldn't be...but maybe they were and that explained why they had made up now. But still, it might pry some explanation as to what was going on out of her. Why was he so intent on finding out anyway? If it was anything serious Kakashi-senpai would have informed him, he should just be happy it was all over now.

But he _HAD_ to know.

Seeing Kakashi turn over and his arm creep onto the curve of Hanare's waist and then Hanare inch closer to him was startling. He had never seen his mentor with a woman before, especially not in a tender position such as this one. He had his books and given, he did flirt shamelessly whenever he and Guy-sama had sake drinking competitions. But at the end of the night, he would always stumble his way home, always alone. Tenzo had never questioned the sexual preferences of the Copy nin, who openly read hentai written by the most heterosexual man on the planet, securing kakashi a spot in atleast the top 5 biggest perverts in Konoha. Nevertheless, actually seeing him like that with a girl was something to be awed upon. He wasn't sure if Kakashi had awoken to find himself in that position when Hanare rolled over to face him. He sluggishly removed his arm and resumed his initial position at the wall. It seemed as if both parties remained sleeping through is whole ordeal. Tenzo didn't know what to think so he just hopped out of the sole window the cabin had and leant against the door frame. Any more surprises like that and he would have a hard time keeping it from Anko when she, no doubt, would question him about it.

Kakashi's watch had ended at day break and with everyone soon awake they started their trek to the farm lands where they hoped would find some relation of cuddly poops. Two days and a significant number of miles separated them from their last fight and the Akatsuki member had yet to make an appearance. Even so, before heading to the direction of Konoha, the group turned right at the cross roads to the busy village Hanare had sensed there. Maybe, they might find some leads to cuddly poops family there. Deciding that using chakra to change their appearance would be too draining, they procured some civilian clothes and roamed the streets of the town. It was definitely a busy town with all the modern technology one could wish. Being part of a hidden ninja village meant that most luxuries were rare. Konoha had one cinema, no cars and while most homes had a land line telephone, it was not considered smart to use them for important calls as they could be easily tapped.

This town, or more like a city, had cars vrooming past every second, telephone lines and satellite dishes clouded the skys while high rise apartment building rose up at every corner.

"Awesome" Hanare murmured with a grin as the group walked along the side walk.

Kakashi had stopped a few feet behind them and when they noticed, turned to see what had halted him. He was infront a harem bar. His hands stuffed into his pockets and his eyes glued to the inside of the bar. As if on que, Anko and Hanare stomped towards him. While Hanare brought her fist down onto his head Anko, holding the baby, began belting out a series of words that began with his name followed by idiot, pervert, pig and so on.

While he begged for mercy on his knees, Tenzo had serenely walked up to their side and followed the direction Kakashi was trying, to no avail, to point to. His hazel eyes found a large man, dressed in red with a long mane of spiky white hair seated in the bar, a bottle of booze in one hand and a blond in the other. He had his head perked up at the commotion outside and finally realising what and who was there, whispered something to the scantily clad woman and made his way to the door.

With a laugh he boomed, "What have we here Kakashi-kun? Anko-chan is that you? When did you have a baby?"

The women ceased their pummelling and looked up at the man.

"Jiraiya-sama" Anko started bewildered and then catching on to what he had said, yelled, "THAT IS NOT MY CHILD! Geez what the hell is wrong with both off you!?"

"Heh heh, I asked the same thing when I saw them too" Kakashi whined weakly hoping for some redeeming. Anko just knocked him on his head once more.

"Get off the floor my boy, you have no idea the pollution they have in this place." Jiraiya literally raised him up by his shoulders. Seeing kakashi next to the sanin really put his height into perspective. Kakashi was over 6 feet and by konohagakure's standard taller than average. Jiraiya stood a full head taller than kakashi, well, if you flattened down kakashi's hair it would have been a full head.

"And who is this delightful young woman?" the drool was pouring out of Jiraiya's mouth in bucketfuls.

"Uh-um- Akiyama Hanare" she said awkwardly leaning as far back as she could without falling over.

Kakashi stepped between what little space they had between them, "JIRAIYA-sama, what are you doing here, well besides that" he directed his eyes to the bar.

"Research as always, I trust you enjoyed Icha Icha Violence as much as Paradise?"

"Ofcourse, it was even better, I just loved the way they both finally admitted their love for each other during the big fight of the war, but then after her family came in the way, and then you find out it was his parents who spread the rumour about him in the first place. And then it was the shoe salesman-"

"Dude, spoiler alert!" Hanare cut in.

"It's not like you were going to read it anyway." He whispered over his shoulder.

Jiraiya pushed kakashi back onto the floor and took Hanare's hands, "You're a fan of my writing!" he exclaimed.

"Ah...well, I read the first one...it was...good" Hanare stuttered.

"And you're supposed to be an espionage specialist, even cuddly poops could spot that lie a mile away." Anko's mouth was twisted to one corner of her face.

"Espionage, interesting, are you aware that infiltration and information gathering are my specialities?" Jaraiya watched her closely.

"Actually I do." She replied with a smile.

"Ok," Kakashi pushing himself between them for the second time sighed, "we should _not_ be discussing private Konoha information in the middle of the street."

To this they all agreed and Jiraiya led them to a small but secluded restaurant down the street. Getting a table at the very back of the restaurant they all took their seats. Hanare sat across from Kakashi and Tenzo across from Jiraiya. Anko handed over the child to Hana and finding it convenient that there were 4 chairs, decided to take her seat on Kakashi's lap. She shot Hanare a gloating look and wrapped her arms around his neck.

"Comfortable?" Kakashi asked dryly with a half closed eye.

"Extremely." She smirked and shifted her hips higher up his thighs.

"Anko-chan, I'm sure you would find me a much better seat than kakashi." Jiraiya assured all too eagerly grasping the air infront of him.

"No thanks, I'm perfect right here." She grinned.

"Hanare-chan, you should come and show Anko-chan what she's missing" Jiraiya displayed his lap.

"No thank you, Jiraiya-sama." She ground out.

Hanare was staring at Anko with such intensity that she was sure Anko would have burn marks tomorrow. While her pulse was racing in the ears, she felt her heart drop as Kakashi made no effort to remove the woman from his lap. Hanare though her head would pop from the mere pressure that was building inside her, that was consuming all her logical means. Hanare never wanted to assault someone more in her life. The bitch was asking for it. Hauling herself on kakashi like that and wiggling her ass in that mini skirt ontop of him. And the audacity of the man to just let her stay likes that in public! In front of his team, a legendary sanin, with everyone watching; with his own...

What was Hanare to kakashi?

Not his girlfriend, not his fiancé, not his lover, not even his pretend wife anymore. She was nothing to him that she should be feeling these emotions right now. She should not feel...jealous. She was jealous and every cell in her body felt the sting of it. Never in her life, towards anyone, did she feel this kid of gut wrenching jealousy. This depressing coldness that threatened to wash over her.

"Are you ok?" Tenzo leant towards her and placed a hand on her knee.

Hanare blinked once, twice and said, "Fine, just thinking about something." She realised she was pressing the two pendants on her chain onto her palm the whole while and let go.

"You're letting him go"

"What?!" Hanare eyes widened in surpise.

"He's falling out of ur arms." Tenzo directed her attention to the baby falling out of her hands. Oh, Tenzo hadn't placed his hand on her knee, he was merely supporting cuddly poops.

Thankfully, the waitress appeared at the point and after everyone ordered, and a few perverted glances from the sanin, she left.

Tenzo explained what the mission, commissioned through ANBU, detailed and the reason for the presence of the youngest member at the table who was now being tickled by Hanare. Jiraiya stayed deep in thought while a waiter came and delivered their food, as well as an extra chair for Anko. Hanare notice the waitress, Jiraiya was no doubt undressing with his eyes earlier, had not returned. Not that it mattered because Jiraiya had not taken his eyes off the spot on the table for the last 10 minutes. Everyone was half finished with their food, everyone but kakashi, when he spoke up.

"Jiraiya-sama, you weren't only in this area because of research for your book, am I right?"

Jiraya shook his head, "I've been researching the Akatsuki. I have reason to believe they have a strong hold somewhere in Tanigakure."

"That's possible, we have been tailing Kisame for weeks and though he has been alone, he stayed in The land of Rivers. Right before he attacked us, another member, a white man surrounded in this... plant like thing, appeared in the ground and they only spoke for seconds before he disappeared. Then Kisame went, and a few minutes later he ambushed us." Anko, who had only just moved off of kakashi, finding it impossible to eat in that position, related.

"Why was he after you, Tenzo-kun? You said he kept coming after you and ignored Anko-chan at first." Jiraiya asked.

"I have no idea. I was thinking about it, and it doesn't seem likely that they knew who we were. Kisame didn't detect us till that other person informed him. And if it was... Orochimaru... who planned it, they wouldn't just take one without the other." Tenzo finished in a hushed tone.

Jiraiya stayed silent a moment longer. Sometime during this discourse the rice and curry had disappeared off of kakashi's plate.

"I think that I'll have to join you four on a trip back to the village. I want to speak to saru-sensei about this a bit more." He stated with a smile.

"We need to find cuddly poops family first" Anko interjected.

"Yes, yes. We will do that first. Then to Konohagakure."

_**More chapters soon !**_


	7. Chapter 7

_**This is late...I know... My laptop died... be angry at it, not me. ^_/**_

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Deciding to split into groups seemed the fastest way to cover this huge town. Hanare felt the pressure in her chest returning. What _exactly_ had happened between them? Kakashi had been his usual aloof, uninterested self up until they ran into Jiraiya. The problem: Kakashi never acted like his usual self around her. She was privileged with the conversational, sweet toned, if somewhat deviously childlike side of the Copy Ninja. She understood his cynical humour and constant use of sarcasm that laced everything he uttered. Now that the ice between them had cracked slightly, Hanare wanted to go with Kakashi and try to talk to him about the night before and then, the night before the night before, and maybe a bit on his parameters for personal space with the opposite sex. But the world was working against her.

Jiraiya wanted to go with Kakashi and everyone took the hint that the grown-ups needed privacy to discuss important matters without listening ears. It had been 5 years since Jiraiya had been to Konoha and 5 years since he had seen the student of his student. Sometime during those years Kakashi had taken to adding 'sama' to the end of Jiraiya's name. Last he recalled kakashi addressed him as just Jiraiya or maybe a Jiraiya-Sensei if he was in a good mood. Maybe being Captain of ANBU had given him some degree of priority, the little brat was getting as pig-headed as Minato by the time he was 7.

Speaking of which, he needed to find out about his Godson, was he graduating the academy this year or next year? Had the Kyuubi rampaged through the village lately? How was Saru-sensei managing all these rumours about the new shinobi village called the Hidden Key? How were the inner workings of the village going? Did they finish those extensions on the women's bathhouse yet? He really needed to keep track of these things. Jiraiya's visits to his village were short, a few days, maybe a week or two if the view was good. He would catch a glance at the blonde boy he had unintentionally given the name to, catch up with his Sensei, pass by a few others if he felt like it and then to his research! At the present, being with Kakashi, one of the few men that he trusted fully that were still alive, he had alot of information to collect.

Tenzo and Hanare took the East side of the town, Kakashi and Jiraiya, with baby in tow, would go South West and Anko North West. Tenzo didn't want to stick the two women together and risk another nuclear explosion. Hana had just reconciled with Anko for her assumption on her and Kakashi "doing it" by their joint efforts on pummelling the Jonin, when Anko had to stir the pot again by draping herself all over kakashi at lunch.

He wondered at their true feelings. He had seen countless women pine over his mentor; destroy friendships and ties for his attention. Ofcourse, Kakashi never seemed to notice even the most gaudy and over the top confessions. And once those females captured the interest of another man or ultimately realised that their affections would never be returned, gave up. Surely, Hanare and Anko could not be a part of such sillyness, then again...maybe he wouldn't put it past them.

"I don't know what this is but I want one" Hanare rubbed a spiralling multi-coloured petal between her fingers.

"You like flowers? I didn't take you for the girly type." Tenzo asked finally catching up to Hanare, who had been attracted like a moth to a flame to the tables of plants outside the town's flower shop.

"Well I _am_ a girl, but that doesn't mean I'm about to put on a tutu and prance around the village in high heels" she defended. Tenzo only shrugged.

"I like growing things, it's nice to have a little itty bitty thing and take care of it, only to find one day its grown and has bloomed and is absolutely beautiful." She continued, now fascinated by a half dead thing sticking out of a pot.

Tenzo peered at it over her shoulder and one side of his mouth perked up. He nudged her out of the way and took the pot up. Sliding his eyes closed, he focused and within a few seconds the dried up stick, became a green, succulent plant, unfurling glorious blue flowers.

Hanare stared at the pot astounded and when she realised Tenzo was staring down at her, she beamed up a winning smile and said cockily, "I'm not the only one who likes flowers."

"They're nice" he huffed, "But I can make all those growing things grow any which way I want and as fast as I want too, it takes the grandeur out of it for me."

"That's cheating, try doing it one day without manipulating the poor thing, it's very rewarding."

"Hn." He responded.

Hanare rolled her eyes, "So you can make any type plant you want to right? Even bring them back from near death?"

"I suppose. It's harder than it sounds you know. Remember I told you my Wood Style isn't any particular species, it is just what results from my two elements. So if I had to recreate a specific type, I would have to know every detail of its cellular make up before I did it properly."

"That didn't seem too hard." Hanare pointed out, looking at the vibrant plant he had just saved.

"That's because I know what a Geranium is...they're not exactly that exotic, there's a whole set of bushes planted outside my apartment building and usually they're pretty pathetic looking, so one day I just gave them some help."

"And they say chivalry is dead." She teased.

Walking around in the mid-day sun, asking if anyone had any information on the child, was not the smartest plan Jiraiya had ever come up with. It was nice to discuss matters with Kakashi though, and it seemed he had all the information Jiraiya could possibly think to ask. It was actually quite ironical that the boy who never cared to know about trivial matters of the village was now in charge of knowing every matter of the village and all other villages. He almost pitied the boy.

Aside from their ramblings, and their attempts to amuse cuddly poops, their quest had been a failure. No leads anywhere. Anko met up with them, a stick of dango on her mouth, with the same results. Now where was their wood style user and espionage specialist? They waited, and waited and an hour later, the possibility of Kisame returning for Tenzo fully surfacing in their minds, they set out to look for them.

"They probably checked into a hotel." Jiraiya suggested...well suggestively.

Kakashi's uncovered eye widened then fell down in disbelief and then opened a bit wider, determined to locate them at once.

"Probably" Anko chimed in.

Kakashi was close to fuming by now, he took at deep breath through his nose and thought back, "We should try the bookstores, or Gardening shops...Anko where did you get that dango, they might be at the sweet shop." Kakashi thought of the number of times Hanare willed her existence to continue any longer without her possession of a doughnut or some monaka or anything filled with or covered in chocolate.

Jiraiya and Anko watched him thoroughly confused as he headed away from them. That could not possibly be any logical plan of action so he must want to go to those places himself. The book shop was a given for Kakashi, he would visit the one in Konoha atleast once a week, and maybe he was hungry already or discovered a dormant sweet tooth. But the flower shop, what the hell did he want to go there for? To make sense of the nonsense they followed after him as he found the way to a Gardening store. Nope they weren't there. Getting directions to the closest bookstore (which was all the way to the other side of town) he set off decidedly.

It was easy to spot them as soon as Kakashi walked through the door. They were gazing at the 'sex/erotica' section from two isles away and smiling at each other. It made Kakashi sick.

"How does he do it? They actually have the nerve to name it 'sex slash erotica'. How can someone just waltz their way up to that wall with that sign hanging over them and casually pick out a book they might be interested in buying?" Hanare shook her head, the incredulous smile and blush on her face growing.

"You need to see when Kakashi senpai does it," Tenzo barely holding in a laugh, "it was like someone finally put a neon arrow pointing down on him. That sign just flashed 'Warning- PERVERT, PERVERT, PERVERT." Tenzo and Hanare had to bite their lips and twist their faces into tortured expressions just to prevent themselves from cracking up under their imaginations. Hanare spotted the silver hair approaching them before Tenzo had and silenced him with a "Shhhh" moving her eyes from him to the direction Kakashi was coming from, hoping Tenzo would understand.

"You are supposed to be out there looking for information!" Kakashi scolded.

"We did and found out nothing, we were actually coming to look for you all when I just popped in here for a second." Hanare and Tenzo exchanged nervous glances while their faces strained with the smile that threatened to tug their lips up.

Jiraiya and Anko joined them, still thoroughly confused how Kakashi had known where to locate them. All in all, this day was a failure. They would have to search blindly the next day for a home for their baby seeing as the sun was starting its descent downwards. Finding the cheapest hotel in town, the four ANBU members only had enough money to pay for two rooms. If Jiraiya hadn't been feeling especially generous, as he had only just picked up the third royalty check for his books, they would have had a very interesting night. At the very least Hanare suspected it wouldn't have been too hard to charm their way to a few extra rooms. The bleached blond woman at the desk, who couldn't have been more than a year or two older than herself, kept trying to flirt with Kakashi and Tenzo. She even responded with an obnoxious giggle to Jiraiya. Uhhh.

Everyone ended up with their own claustrophobic rooms just narrow enough to fit a bachelor bed, with a single paned window beside them. Oh well, the bed was comfortable, and it was an actual bed, a vast improvement from what they had been sleeping on for the last few days. Hanare wanted nothing more than to crash on her bed but she figured a bath would be best. What had it been...3days? She needed to wash and smell like a girl again. The baby could use a bath too she decided. So with cuddly poops in her arms she ventured into the hallway in search of the bath area. Anko bumped into her, a towel turban wrapped around her head.

"You don't want to take a bath now," Anko warned "I saw Jiraiya-sama go in that direction on my way up."

Hanare pretended to shiver, "Thanks, I'll give cuddly poops a bath then, until he leaves."

"Take your time, which rooms are the boys in again?" Anko headed for the room next to Hanare's where Kakashi had disappeared into.

Not wanting to relive THAT again, Hanare turned on her heels and stalked to the ground floor and into the women's indoor bath area. It was small, only having one little soaking pool, a few showers and scrubbing stations and aside from herself, there were only two other women there. One was probably in her forties and the other in her fifties. Not much for Jiraiya to see here, hopefully he would get bored soon and Hanare could take off the itchy hotel robe. How did she end up in the room between Kakashi and Anko's, she thought miserably, she should count her blessings that Jiraiya was next to Anko and not her.

After 15 minutes of gently rubbing cuddly poops clean, much to his disapproval, she still sensed the pervert somewhere near. The room was sealed off from the men's bath next door. No obvious cracks or holes anywhere on the walls, the ceiling was sound and Jiraiya was extremely too large to fit in any of the vents.

Wait a minute! The vents! God she was an idiot...

The one high up on the wall separating the women's and men's bath. Hanare glared at the thing with all the portentous threatening she could muster. Three seconds later a muffled *crash* was heard and Hanare smiled gloatingly as she slipped her bathrobe off and began washing off the accumulated dirt of three days. She loved the subtle vanilla scented body wash the bath provided. It wasn't what she normally used but it was sweet and calming and clean. Soon after the pair of women left, Hanare stepped into the warm soaking pool, clutching cuddly poops to her bare chest.

"Now I can imagine an old pervert who would kill to be in your position right now." She whispered mischievously to the baby boy in her arms.

It was so much fun bobbing up and down in the water with the baby. Making his face light up in delight as his musical laugh bounced off the tiled room. One day, she thought, she'll get to go to the bath house in Konoha with her own little children just like this. Sweet, little baby with silver hair and dark brown eyes. No, maybe silver hair and Kakashi's dark eyes. What colour where they anyway? Sometimes they were the darkest possible shade of navy, then in the right light they would be black as night with the silvery shimmer like a moon casting its light from behind a cloud. It would be nice to see what kakashi looked like as a baby and as a child, younger than when she had first laid eyes on him. He had had matching eyes then, now, one was perpetually red.

She set cuddly poops on the floating tray that usually held bath soaps and salts and held it steady with one hand to keep him from tipping over. While cuddly poops giddily splashed in the water that spilled over the rim of the tray Hanare's mind finally decided to catch up with her delusional thoughts.

What the hell had just crossed her mind! Thinking about what the children between Kakashi and herself would look like. She would drown herself right now if it didn't mean letting go of cuddly poops. Instead, still holding onto the edge of the tray with one hand, she ducked her head under the water and slowly let out a trail of bubbles with her mouth. Kakashi's pendant and her team's floated up into her line of vision. Light bounced off of them as they swirled in the water, one gold and one silver. It was mesmerising looking at them dance as they sparkled.

By the time she realised she needed air, her head was spinning and she burst out of the water, standing up gasping so that the water only came up to her waist. Cuddly poops, oblivious to the turmoil going through her head, looked up at her as if he questioned his well being in the care of this crazy person. She stuck her tongue out at the baby, a truly appropriate response she thought. Then remembering the vent above her head she splashed back down submerging up to her neck in the warm water.

She didn't sense anyone, she was safe. After a long drawn out sigh, cuddly poops resumed his splashing and Hanare her thoughts. It's not like she had never fantasized about the man before, but her fantasies had never been based on the hope that had developed during their time together.

"More like false hope" She thought.

The possibility then dawned on her. Kakashi could be leading her on. If he was anything like Jiraiya, then as soon as he got his little fling, he would be gone. Nooooo, Kakashi wasn't like that, she forced herself to believe, he couldn't be. They have been talking and hanging around each other for months and he never came off like that, aside from his usual racy-ness. He had given her a priceless piece of his life, well he didn't seem to care much for it, but that didn't make its monetary value decrease any more. And he had somewhat kind of taken her out for diner before she had left on this mission. That _was_ a date. He had given her a present (sort of), taken her out for dinner (he did pay...and feed her off his chopsticks), they had talked about their personal lives, laughed, Kakashi even shared something out of his past with her and since he returned from his last mission they had seen each other every day. It was promising. That or, he was getting impatient after two months of not getting any from her.

No he REALLY wasn't that bad.

He was just a nice person; caring, loyal, considerate the list could go on. Hanare couldn't think of anyone who might name those things in a description of the famed ninja but kakashi was more open with her than he was with most other people in his life, she noticed. This lead to the unsightly option that Kakashi thought of her as one of the guys, like a sibling (uhhh...) or a friend that he could never have any romantic tendencies for and therefore safe to share things with.

Maybe he was gay.

Hanare found both solace and repulsion in that one. She chuckled softly to herself; she had become one of _those_ people who thought if she couldn't have him no one can! Well no other women at least. She shook her head, her long wet hair fanning out on the surface of the water.

"Ok sweety, both of us are pruned enough, time to dry off." She reached over to pick up the squirming baby off of the tray.

"JIRAIYA-SAMA" Hanare recognised the unison of Kakashi and Tenzo screaming voices coming through the vent. Then another *crash*. Thankfully she hadn't stood up yet and only the upper part of her cleavage was visible above the steamy water.

That was _Kakashi's_ voice. He was right next door in the other room. Quite possibly naked as well. Oh for heaven's sake, why did people put images like that in her head!?

How similar was Kakashi to Jiraiya? Would he be tempted to peek over to the ladies bath. The florist back in the Land of Clouds had said he never ever peeked in at the girls. But what did an old woman see, if not very much.

Hanare had the sudden inexplicable urge to get up from the water and practise some of her more provocative moves she used as an undercover dancer. Oh hell she was pathetic. Her face flushed, not sure if it was from the steam or her emotions. Would kakashi even like what he saw? She wasn't all that curvy, she had some breasts and an ass that fit her frame but it wasn't like those voluptuous, exceedingly sexy women that men yearned over. Under the water, she passed her hands down the shape of herself to get a better feel for her proportions. Kakashi's own half naked profile flashed in her mind and a shudder passed through her naked body.

Ok, she _definitely_ had enough now. Checking to ensure that no chakra signatures could be felt from anywhere near the vent in question, she rose out of the water and hurriedly wrapped herself in her robe, not caring that it was heavy and damp from the steam which only served to make it more uncomfortable and itchy. Snatching cuddly poops out of the water she half ran to the changing room to re-dress herself and then to her room hoping to beat any of the men she had left in the bath area there.

After a bottle of milk, cuddly poops fell asleep soundlessly. All her adventures in her head that evening, left Hanare even more exhausted than she had been before and she settled into bed, still damp, cradling the child to her and drifted to sleep.

Down on the first floor, Jiraiya, Tenzo and Kakashi had emerged from their baths and he older man was doing his best to encourage them to join him for a drink or drinks at the bar. Even though this mission had taken a few surprising turns it was still a mission and drinking was bad idea whichever way you looked at it. Kakashi was easy to persuade as he was fairly sure Anko would still be staking out in his room, and wanting to avoid her at all costs he readily took Jiraiya up on his offer. Tenzo figured that they would go whether he joined them or not and if he had any hope of ever seeing them again, he should go and babysit them while they drank their way to finally achieving liver necrosis.

At the bar, Tenzo and Kakashi ordered water, though that proved ineffectual as Jiraiya kept dipping the contents of his sake bottle into their glasses. Tenzo, having no stomach for any bit of alcohol, was soon tipsy and found alot of amusement in trying to balance his glass on the tip of his pinky finger. He was actually doing pretty well when Jiraiya clapped his hand on Kakashi's back drawing his attention away.

"Now I feel the need to warn you about something my boy, as I myself have had many, many, many, many women obsess themselves with yours truly, but you need to be careful about those kinds of things, they can get ugly very fast." Jiraiya lectured. "Especially involving a fellow shinobi, and one who is rather lovely and dangerous at that."

"Huh?" Kakashi's head cocked to the side, not having the faintest clue as to what was going on.

"I'm talking about Hanare-chan" He clarified, "today I saw she had a rather interesting piece of jewellery around her neck, and it was inscribed with your family name."

"Oh that" Kakashi finally caught on, "No Jiraiya-sensei, it's not like that at all, I gave her that."

"You gave her?"

"Well yes, but at some point she thinks she's going to have to earn it."

"Kakashi, you sly dog you, I didn't know how much you took after me." Jiraiya nudged him, a proud smile spread across his face. "I might just have to use that in my next sequel."

Kakashi hung his head and sighed, while the prospect was intriguing and it made him feel as if he was floating (no that was probably the alcohol), it wasn't anything like that and Hanare would probably hammer him into the ground for even thinking of the sort.

Kakashi rather enjoyed the sensual thoughts about Hana that his mind would conjure up. Although, he couldn't stomach the thought of it being due to something like that. He was a closet romantic, even if the village knew he was an open pervert, he didn't care much for what other people thought. But in all his dreams he would be with Hanare in the most loving, rapturous moments filled with so much hot-blooded passion that even Maito Gai wouldn't be left standing. And he relished each and every moment of it with ecstasy. Kakashi honestly acknowledged it was possibly the closest he would ever get to the real thing. He was slowly willing himself to accept that. Though, just because he was destined to a life of solitude, didn't mean he couldn't enjoy the time he did spend with his Hana. She was free to do as she liked, and if she liked spending that time with him, all the better. It wasn't like she was hopelessly in love with him like he...huh,

Ok, it was time he was honest about his feelings, if only to himself. It wasn't a mere infatuation, or a physical attraction. It was the kind of thing he had forbidden himself from for so long, the kind of thing he could only read about because he believed it impossible to exist outside of his novels. He wanted her all for himself; he wanted her for as long as his heart had the capacity to beat. He loved her.

He had absolutely nothing to compare it to. In all his life he had never felt anything like what would go through him every time he so much so as heard Hanare's name spoken. She had the ability to turn his complex mind into mush with one sweet glance. Whenever she was there his eye would follow her, when she was not his heart would search for her. Every millisecond he spent in her presence he wanted to reach out and run his fingers through those dark silky locks, to caress her soft skin, to hold her body next to his and never let go.

What _was_ he to do with all these emotions now that he had owned up to their existence? Well it never hurt to pay Hanare a visit, just to confirm his feelings ofcourse.

It was after midnight when he made his way up to his room alone. Jiraiya and Tenzo had staggered to bed a good hour earlier but Kakashi stayed back looking for some motivation, the liquid type, to knock on Hanare's door. He didn't quite do it right as he just sat at the bar, looking into his glass, lost in his thoughts. It was too late to do anything at this hour anyway. Just go to bed and forget everything for a while.

It was the perfect plan of action, up until he opened his door and caught sight of Anko sitting cross legged on his bed, eating a pear from a fruit basket.

"Where have you been?" she asked taking another bite.

"Where did you get that?" Kakashi completely ignored her question.

She shrugged, "Compliments of the hotel, or actually that slutty clerk who checked us in, she delivered it personally to your room."

Kakashi shuffled over and picked up a bunch of grapes, "I'm tired, can you please go sleep in your own room."

"I've grown rather attached to this one," she dragged one finger down Kakashi's chest, "I'll just stay here for the night."

Kakashi rolled his visible eye and exited cooly from the room. He would just camp out in Tenzo's for the night, and this also gave him an excuse to question the man on his day with Hanare.

Before his knuckles could make contact with the door it was pulled open and Hanare looked up at him.

He felt his heart leap into his throat, "Oh, sorry, I thought this was Tenzo's room." Kakashi locked eyes with Hanare drinking in the sight of her, her hair still tousled with sleep.

"It is. He's completely out of it though." Hanare stepped aside to let kakashi view a very messy bed with Tenzo heavily drooling ontop hugging an identical fruit basket to the one in his room. To the side of him, cuddly poops lay in a wooden crib atop a pillow which fit the length of it.

Kakashi could only stare, every terrible thought running through his mind mercilessly. He felt his heart drop to the floor of his stomach on to a pile of dead butterflies. He blinked, trying to string a coherent thought together. When his brain would not restart, he backed out of the doorframe and started towards his room.

Hanare followed him to his door down the hall before she realised her feet were moving. She stood between him and his door. "What's your problem?"

"Hn." He averted his eyes to his feet.

"Kakashi" she mouthed softly.

He glanced up to her face, every part of him felt damaged as she looked back at him blankly. He reached passed her and opened his door, but not before she could put half her body through it to prevent him from slamming it in her face. Anko chose this moment to announce her presence from kakashi's bed.

Hanare's eyes widened in shock seeing the woman wrapped up in the sheets, she couldn't tell if Anko had anything on under them. Hanare held her breath as she watched kakashi, who was equally distressed, hoping for some sort of explanation.

Massaging his temples Kakashi spoke in a grave, commanding voice that Hanare had never heard come out of his mouth, "Anko, get the hell out of my room, NOW." He pronounced each and every syllable perfectly.

The tone he spoke in had gotten to her as she arched her eyebrows for a fraction of a second before getting up, so she was wearing clothes after all, and made her way to the door, shooting Hanare a curious glance.

Hanare was following her out when kakashi's hand caught her wrist pulling her in and shutting the door. They stood in silence, not looking at each other. Then kakashi went to the bed picked up an apple and tossed it at Hanare over his shoulder. She snatched it out of the air in time to see from behind him, kakashi tug his mask down and hear a savage bite being taken out of another apple.

Kakashi didn't care at the moment; he needed to kill something, or someone. It made it easy as his former student was currently passed out two rooms away. He would deal with him later.

With his back still to Hana he took a shallow breath, swallowed, "What were you doing in his room?" he completely steadied his voice, not giving away anything.

"What was SHE doing in your room?" Hanare's voice rising with irritation.

Kakashi had to count backwards from 10 before answering in his aloof manner, "She's Anko, she lives to make people uncomfortable. I just got back and when I saw her here I was going to sleep in Tenzo's room." He said the last sentence with a touch of accusation.

That didn't faze Hanare though, "It's the middle of the night, how did you JUST get back?"

"I was at the bar with those idiots, then I was at the bar alone without those idiots." He put his mask back into place with one hand and turned to face Hanare waiting for her explanation.

She slumped her shoulders, "Tenzo came into my room, completely drunk and woke me and the baby up, so I had to take him back to his room and his drunken self decided the kid needed a crib and then a rocking chair and a five seat dining set." Hanare smiled at the scene in her head. "so basically a house full of furniture later, he finally passed out and I was going back to bed, IN MY ROOM."

Kakashi dropped down to sit on the edge of his small bed, deflated, "Sorry I let Tenzo near _the half of an ounce_ of sake he drank."

Hanare threw her uneaten apple at his head, he didn't even bother to dodge letting it bounce off his Hitai-ate and fall to the floor. She approached him slowly, secretly pleased by the sight of his mask that was lopsided from hurriedly pulling it up with one hand.

"I'm sorry too." Hanare said as she flopped down next to Kakashi on the bed. "Friends?" she offered her hand to him.

Kakashi looked at her hand for a moment, he didn't want to agree to this, he wanted to be more than friends. He wanted to place an arm around her and draw her into a gentle kiss that would take her breath away. He wanted to little by little descend onto the bed with her in his arms and feel every bit of her against him, to live out his fantasies and wake up the next morning with Hanare still next to him. He had believed he had lost his Hana forever a few minutes ago and now all he wanted to do was profess his love so that he could keep her forever.

But.

He was a ninja and he had his duty. He could not have a relationship, nor a family. For a ninja, those small pleasures did not last. It was only a matter of time till they would be taken away and he could not bear to have his world crumble in on him again.

He took her hand in his, "Friends" he plastered his usual happy expression on his face.

Hanare focused on him, a small frown on her lips. When Kakashi's expression did not change Hanare slipped her's away in one long caress of hands.

"Goodnight then." She got off the bed.

"Hana, you could stay a bit longer if you'd like"

Her lips parted slightly waiting for a response that would not come.

"Just to talk like we did on our last mission, I missed talking to you the last few days, I feel like Tenzo is slowly replacing me." He laughed genuinely this time. He might as well be truthful to her. That was allowed in his original plan right?

It warmed Hanare's heart seeing her Kakashi again, "Not a chance, he has no taste in literature."

"So, you'll stay?" his eyes glowing with hope as he asked.

Hanare bit down on her lip, she couldn't say no to that face. But kakashi had taken so long to just accept her hand and in turn her friendship. That still stung at the back of her mind. She needed to collapse into unconsciousness for a while and think about their confusing relationship, so she replied,

"If you wanted to talk to me then you should have just talked to me." She flicked him on the wrist. "I'm actually tired. So, I promise to grace you with my voice all day tomorrow ok." She smiled teasingly at him.

"Promise?" he raised a mocking silver eyebrow at her.

She giggled, "Pinky promise." And she held out her littlest finger. It was a more in the moment decision and a bit to see if he had developed a repulsion to touching her since that night in the forest when she placed her hand on his chest. It didn't seem so as he immediately wrapped his finger around hers. Again in the moment, and without thinking, Hanare bent her head and placed a swift kiss on the back of Kakashi's pinky finger.

She cleared her throat, embarrassed, "It's the full ritual of pinky promises I did when I was a little girl" Well it wasn't a lie. She did do it like that when she was a kid.

Kakashi's eye crinkled in a smile. Hanare had been with him enough times to guess what each small movement of Kakashi's visible features meant.

He dipped his head, closed his eye and met her finger with masked lips, pressing a chaste kiss onto it. Looking at him do that was more mesmerising than almost drowning earlier watching his pendant twinkle in the water. Slowly pulling back, he watched Hanare under his dark lashes.

She broke out in a smile, her face crimson. And with that they bid each other good night. She tiptoed as sluggishly to the door as she could, feeling his eyes on her, hopeful that he would call her back once more, knowing that she would go running back.

Hanare left Kakashi for her own room... only to find Anko waiting for her there. She wondered if it still wasn't too late to go back to kakashi, but she might end up staying there the entire night and that would be even harder to explain. With her current mood, not even Anko could bring down; she figured it was time to just tell the purple haired kunoichi _some_ of what was going on. Oh, this was going to be a long night.

Two days and countless farms and houses later, the ANBU team were still accommodating their youngest and oldest members. Everyone was in a better mood with the protection that the Sanin's mere presence provided and no one would complain about their tiniest member. Atleast cuddly poops took a liking to Jiraiya-sama so that took half the work out of babysitting both. By sticking the infant with the legend, Jiraiya was far less likely to forget his plans and run after every famer's daughter he laid his eyes upon and cuddly poops hadn't cried all day. With the exception of the extremely inappropriate bed time stories that Jiraiya would tell, either involving smut or some gruesome battle, and the probability that he had never held a baby in his life, things were turning out on the sunny side if there ever was one.

"It's the gray hair" Tenzo concluded.

"No, I think it has to do with body temperature" Hanare pointed out.

"The kid likes mighty manly men" Anko added.

"HEY" Tenzo interjected in a voice far from a mighty manly man.

"I meant depraved, shamelessly corrupt kind of manly men" Anko waved him off with a smile.

The three were trailing a few feet behind said grey haired men, walking huddled together and whispering all possible reasons cuddly poops had obviously chosen those two as his favourites. They were more than a little peeved, Tenzo was the one who saved him, Hana and her obsession with babies and Anko...well she just didn't like losing. A little satisfied smile spread across Hanare's face realising that they were acting like newbie genin, gossiping about their Sensei behind his back. She shared her amusement with her teammates who broke out with their own child like grins. Anko and Tenzo exchanged knowing looks at each other, still smiling.

Neither of them had been on the traditional three genin and one Jonin team. Anko was personally picked by Orichimaru out of the academy to be his sole protégé, or that was his story anyway, and Tenzo learnt his basics in ANBU ROOT before the Third Hokage had placed him under Kakashi in the normal ANBU headquarters. This mission had been rather surprising so far, and unlike the usual ANBU grade, this surprising was peculiarly good.

Hanare had missed their exchange, looking straight ahead at the men who had stopped and were looking down to the child sleeping in Jiraiya's secure arms. She fixed her eyes on kakashi in particular, an easy thing to do seeing as it was a favourite past time of hers.

Tenzo may have been handsome but Kakashi was breathtakingly beautiful. She dreamed up the memory of seeing his face at the stream in the Land of Clouds, his smell, and touch. His voice was her favourite, how she could listen to that voice for hours. She had purposefully started a fight/discussion with him more than once just so that she could hear that voice for long spells and the wonderful things that voice would say. Sometimes simple, nearing senseless, other times she would hear speeches of such profound intelligence that any reply she could formulate seemed unworthy.

With Hanare's group catching up to the others, they had to revisit their plans. They were almost to the border now and only one or two inhabited farms remained. They were starting to get worried that they would have to carry cuddly poops to Konoha with them. That would be alot of explaining to do. Hanare took the baby from Jiraiya and put him on her shoulder. She still couldn't look Jiraiya straight in the eye after seeing the bleach blond check-in clerk leave his hotel room the morning after her exchange with kakashi and then Anko. She had almost died of perpetual shock and revulsion. Some things she absolutely did not need to know.

Anko was also draping herself on Kakashi far less during the last two days for the surprisingly little Hanare had told her. Yes, life was good.

"We just continue on if we don't find anyone." Kakashi stated.

Secretly, Hanare didn't want that to happen. If cuddly poops was taken to Konoha then he would be placed in the orphanage. And all orphans were placed in the academy. Most become shinobi. She had mixed feelings about that. While she knew she wouldn't hesitate to send her own children to the academy to become ninja, especially if they were the spawn of Kakashi who had genes as precious to the village as the Hyuuga or Uchiha had been (_bad thoughts, very bad thoughts_). She wasn't sure it was the right thing to do for the child in their position now. His parents had been civilians, probably just happily married with prospects of a happy, normal life for their new born son. He should be left in his world with his family. Left without options, she just had to silently agree.

Pushing her way between Jiraiya and Kakashi proved harder than expected and as soon as she broke through their conversation dropped into silence.

"Really?" she strained her neck looking up at the two men on both her sides, she might as well be looking up at the 100ft trees around Konoha.

"What ever are you talking about?" Kakashi took out his book and hid his face.

"I am in ANBU intelligence, there's hardly anything I don't know already." She tiptoed so that she could see the page he was reading.

Kakashi suddenly snapped the book closed and tapped a finger to the bright red slashed circle with a "21" in the centre. "I believe you're too young for these."

"I was _always_ too young for them, you thought I was 20 when you scammed me into reading it, now I'm 19 and 8 months and I'm suddenly as innocent as a lamb?"

"Exactly." He returned the book to its home in his hip pouch.

"By the way," she turned to Jiraiya, "While it was the most...descriptive thing I ever read, I don't understand what a seventeen year old doesn't know that a twenty-one year old does."

Jiraiya agreed and mumbled something about the publishers not wanting to pollute the minds of teenagers too early.

"Honestly, it's the younger generations that make up all the new stuff. I knew pretty much everything in Icha Icha Paradise by the time I was sixteen."

"You did?!" Kakashi and Jiraiya asked in unison.

Hanare wished there was a rock close by for her to crawl under, "IN THEORY!" she cringed.

"So why did I have to explain all those things to you?" Kakashi inquired.

"Because I wasn't familiar with some of the names for...things, but a pretty word for a dirty thing is still a dirty thing and not everyone has an absurdly perverted mind so I didn't catch on to the fact that every line had subtle erotic references."

Jiraiya had taken out a note pad and pen and was scribbling away furiously while Kakashi used every bit of skilled ninja in him to get a preview of the concepts Jiraiya had planned for the third sequel.

"So far, you're my favourite guy here" Hanare patted cuddly poops.

Both silver haired men turned to look at her thinking she was referring to them. She just rolled her brilliant brown eyes at them.

"Hanare-san, about what you said earlier, I have a jutsu I want to teach you that would come in handy for someone in your field."

Hanare was bursting at the seams. Being handed down a jutsu from the Legendary Sanin Jiraiya! She had definitely lucked out on this mission. Kakashi's lazy eye was touched with suspicion.

"Actually Jiraiya-sama, I was wondering if you can help me with something?" Hanare asked making her eyes sparkle up at him. She definitely should not have done that, instead of the endearing face that no one said no to Jiraiya interpreted it as...

"Oh ho! Anything you want!"

Hanare ducked behind kakashi, putting him between her and the Legendary Pervert.

"Riiiiiight, so I have this jutsu I was working on for years, Inoichi-sensei helped alot but we weren't able to perfect it"

"I'm listening" Jiraiya had settled back down to sensei-mode.

"It's a cranial infiltration jutsu, like the Yamanaka clan's ability, I can enter someone's or even my own mind and see everyone of its memories. I can't actually take over their bodies like Inoichi-sensei but unlike them, this jutsu is supposed to be able to essentially tamper with those memories and thoughts any which way I want."

"That is interesting, what's the problem then?" Jiraiya remarked.

More than Jiraiya, kakashi was dead set concentrated on Hanare, had she infiltrated his mind and made him so unconditionally, hopelessly in love with her. That would explain everything!

"I mastered the mind transfer jutsu, I can even erase whole memories now, and it was hell to learn by the way, when I finally succeeded Inoichi-sensei had lost an entire month of events, needless to say he got into quite a bit of trouble because he couldn't remember what tasks he had done and didn't know what new ones he had been given." Hanare smiled evilly.

"The problem?" kakashi urged.

"Oh yeah, the ones I manipulate or create tend to be different than normal memories, it's not blindingly obvious but a really good ninja who knows they have been infiltrated can easily pick out the fuzzy ones. And you see, The big problem I have is that this was originally developed back in the 2nd Great Shinobi War, for spies to allow themselves to be captured and while they are getting probed they can erase all knowledge of their villages so the enemy can't see it but they would be able to secretly probe all information from the probers mind. I can do that too, and I learnt some EXTREMELY personal things about sensei there, uhhh, but it is hard to maintain." She shook her head clearing those images from them, "I guess I'm asking if you have any ideas how to perfect those fuzzy memories and to maintain my covertness digging through someone's head while they dig through mine"

Jiraiya walked in silence raking his brain for the answer when kakashi asked, "If you can delete any painful memories why do you still know about the disturbing side of Inoichi-san?"

"Just because I can do it doesn't mean I want to." She said matter-of-factly. "Your memories make you who you are, the good and the bad. I've never been captured and put in that situation yet, so I've never had to use it on myself. Plus it will serve as wonderful blackmail if I ever decide to let Inoichi-sensei I know about the birds and the bees."

"So, I take it you have used it on others?" Kakashi asked inching to the real question on his mind.

"Just Sensei, and that one time on his daughter but his wife caught him and gave it to him good before I could actually do anything."

"You never did it on me right?" Kakashi held his breath.

"Nope, I wouldn't want you to forget you owe me dinner again when I actually win this." She tugged on her necklace.

"How do I know? The only reason I could have put something so valuable on a bet could be that you manipulated me into it."

"Kakashi! I didn't! I never used it on anyone on our side. Not even on an enemy. I just raid their minds for intel and leave their personal files alone."

She locked her pleading eyes on his and he knew at that point she could say the sky was green and filled with flying bison and he would believe her.

"I'm just kid-" he began but Jiraiya cut him off.

"I don't know how much I can help you, I specialize in Chakra manipulation, but you already knew that" Hanare nodded, "Either of my old team mates would be of better help. I think the easiest way against that block would be to remove it completely."

"I don't really understand"

"I'm not a hundred percent sure, but I believe the reason that you can't implant those memories perfectly and why it's difficult to keep up the jutsu is because your mind is getting congested by everything going on up there. You would need massive amounts of chakra to establish something like that if you're not part of the Yamanaka clan. The Kaimon is situated in your brain and serves as a barrier as to not overload it with chakra, but in this case you need it, just don't overdo it or you might get a stroke."

"You mean Opening the first gate?" Hanare questioned.

"What else?" Jiraiya laughed, "Just open the first one before you do this jutsu and it should work."

"But I never learnt how to open the gates."

"WHaaaaT? But you are a espionage kunoichi, I'm my day all spies had to be able to open at least the first two. If they got caught they had to get out of there, and fast. A lot of extra strength and speed came in useful back then." Jiraiya finished.

"Things aren't as brutal as they were back then. I manage." Hanare insisted.

"If you are going to be the next captain of Intel in the Hidden Leaf you need to know how to open the gates. I didn't plan on staying long in Konoha, Kakashi-kun doesn't that friend of yours specialize in opening the gates, couldn't he teach Hanare-san."

Obviously Jiraiya was completely oblivious to kakashi's eye popping out of its socket and him waving his hands in front of his chest like a crazy person or he could just be Jiraiya being Jiraiya when he had said that.

"NEXT...CAPTIAN...OF...INTEL?" Hanare squealed at Kakashi who smacked his palm to his forehead.

"Oh I might as well tell you NOW, Hana can stop jumping..." Kakashi drawled.

She stopped jumping in her excitement but her face was lit up like a thousand light bulbs.

Kakashi sighed, "You are under CONSIDERATION, for the position when Yamanaka Yoshi retires at the end of the year."

Hanare bit the inside of her cheek and took three deep breaths. "Okay, thank you for informing me Captain Hatake." She said, satisfied that she sounded as lifeless as kakashi himself.

Kakashi perked an eyebrow up and thought, "Hn, when did she finally figure out I'm in charge?"

"So." She said curtly, "Can you arrange for Gai-san to teach me?"

Kakashi wasn't sure if he was more nervous that she knew of her highly classified promotion or that she wilfully wanted to train under the green beast, "You know Gai too?"

"Who doesn't know Gai? He's the loudest Jonin in the universe. So will you?" She asked.

"I'll ask him, but I can teach to. He's just recently gotten a team of genin so he's busy most days babysitting the youth and what not." Kakashi shaded his eye to watch in the distance, Anko talking to an elderly farmer.

"So he finally accepted a team did he?" Jiraiya followed his gaze.

"Yup, He was just waiting for this one kid to graduate. Reminds him of himself I guess."

"So who are you waiting for?" Jiraiya glanced knowingly at him.

"OY! THIS MAN KNOWS CUDDLY POOPS' FATHER! HURRY UP!" Anko waved at them excitedly.

"Actually the baby's name is Rei." The farmer's wife appeared behind him as the rest of the group came up to the gate.

"How do you know the kid." Jiraiya eyed them sceptically as cuddly poops sprang to life in his arms reaching for the farmer.

"He's my nephew, son of m' youngest brother."

"Oh, Rei-chan" the woman in an apron smelling of bread took cuddly poops, "Taki, what happened? Why is Rei with these people?"

The farmer looked at her with sad eyes.

There was disbelief followed by tears, screams, sobs and moans of regret. In the small kitchen, they were offered the heavenly smelling bread as Jiraiya questioned them insistently. Only with a promise that Hanare would run an extensive background check on these people and saying, more like threatening, that he would check up on them from time to time did he agree to leave cuddly poops..err..Rei in their care. It was what was best for him. He was with his family and he had more than anyone would have initially thought. Aside from the elderly couple, who had three fully grown children of their own, Rei's father had two other brothers and a sister. Most importantly, they were younger and stronger and all were fond of the child.

Hanare kissed the baby for what seemed to be the millionth time and hugged his small body as tightly as she dared. Tenzo and Anko patted cuddly poops and were returned with a big hug from the baby. Kakashi was the last to say good-bye. With cuddly poops in his arms, he raffled his soft locks getting a angry baby noise in return. Kakashi smiled warmly down at him as the child reached up to tug on his silvery hair once more. Jiraiya stood apart, watching contently till his fellow Konoha shinobi joined him and they turned, ready to leave for Konoha.

"You're his honorary Grandpa you know." Hanare tackled into his side and hooked her elbow into his arm.

"Ahhh"

Anko joined Hanare at his other arm, "Such a softie. Soon you'll be retiring and taking up a day job at the academy."

"Uhhh"

Tenzo snickered at Hanare's side and Kakashi's eye squinted in a smile as he brought up the rear.

Without cuddly poops to care for, flitting through the trees brought them back to the gates of Konohagakure right after nightfall.

Everyone's hearts were heavy without cuddly poops, but they knew it was for the best.

"Remember that background check, I was serious." He pointed at Hanare.

"I know, I'll get right on that asap." Hanare accepted her mission. They were all back into their ANBU gear, except for Kakashi and Jiraiya.

"And about that Jutsu I want to teach you," Jiraiya continued, "Meet me outside the Kage tower tomorrow, say after lunch."

"Hai Sensei!" Hanare replied playfully.

"Well, see ya." Jiraiya puffed away leaving Hanare confused.

"Jiraiya-sama never uses front gates, it attracts too much attention and he has people he wants to avoid."

"Avoid?" Hanare was lost.

"You know, the usual," Anko stated, her hands cupped behind her head, "Avengers, debtors, blood thirsty tax collectors-"

"There was that bounty hunter that one time." Tenzo chimed in.

"Then there is the possibility of any one of his ex-girlfriends/flings; that would be terrifying to run into." Kakashi chimed in, his head in his book even though it was too dark to read.

"Wana see who can teleport to HQ the fastest so this mission can be over?" Hanare suggested taking example from the sanin.

One look of consent flashed between the four ninja and the next second all that remained was a large white cloud of smoke.

* * *

_**Again sorry for the wait. At this point, I pretty much know how I want this to end and don't worry it won't be any time soon. But I do have BIG BIG plans. I also am sorry I just gave away cuddly poops like that but I needed to move on fast to get to the BIG things. **_

_**Thank you everyone for the follows/likes/comments. I get so excited when I see any of them. YAY.**_

_**And I want to know you're opinion of, if I should make this into an M fanfic. I have that all planned out too and I love it! It's not the conventional rated M scene but it's definitely lemon-y for the story (may or may not be Kakashi/Hanare)-gasp. If not, I can re-write some future chapters and keep it teen friendly, but you already know my opinion of the rating system from above.**_

_**So please comment what you all would like, thank chu!**_


	8. Chapter 8

Hanare had gone to the Hokage's Tower as eager as a Genin on their first mission; she had been disappointed as a Genin who found out that their first mission was cutting the grass on each and every one of Konoha's training grounds.

Jiraiya-sama was nowhere to be seen when she arrived at their meeting place at the meeting time. Her first thought was that this being ridiculously late thing was probably a trait passed down from teacher to student and such, she was probably two hours too early. She made herself comfortable, leaning against the shady part of the building and used her time to observe the passer-bys.

"STOP ASKING ME THAT! YOU CAN'T FORCE ME TO BE HOKAGE, IF I DIDN'T HAVE TO DEAL WITH THIS EVERYTIME, I WOULD VISIT YOU MORE YOU OLD FART"

Yup, that was Jiraiya.

Hanare strained her head looking up for where his voice was coming from. A flash of red and white came around the top of the building and landed heavily a few feet from her.

Jiraiya smiled, his brow stained with sweat, "Am I late or are you early?"

"You're la-"

Hanare would never get to finish as the Third Hokage came plummeting out of the door, his robes blowing behind him, screaming at Jiraiya to get back in his office.

"Leave me alone!" Jiraiya shouted taking off for the nearest rooftop, "I'll send message for you tomorrow" he called back at Hanare as the Hokage traced Jiraiya's pattern and leapt after him more nimbly than Hanare thought he was capable of doing.

Hanare dragged her feet through the busy street. It was far too hot out for her usual long skirt and wrap top so she settled for her inner burgundy vest and some grey sweat pants to combat the weather. It wasn't working. She should go find Kakashi and ask him to start her training to open the gates and then convince him to be lazy and just hang out till the temperature cooled off.

But that was work. And she was so disappointed not getting to learn the mystery jutsu Jiraiya had promised, all she wanted to do now was go home and sleep. She had dragged herself off the bed this morning for nothing. After a mission like that, all she wanted to do was sleep till dinner and then stuff her face and then some light reading followed by more sleep before she could even fathom going out amongst people again.

She did just that.

* * *

The next day, woken up by a *croooak* she nearly split the poor tiny frog in half with the kunai she kept under her mattress. Luckily she was still groggy and her aim was off. Apologizing for the third time, she took the damp note that was stuck to its back. The little green frog poofed away as soon as it was removed.

_Loveliest Hanare,_

_My apologies for yesterday, it could not be helped. _

_I shall meet you tomorrow at 10am at the hot springs._

_Jiraiya. _

Well the note wasn't as half as creepy as she would have expected. The hot springs part, that was still creepy. She glanced at her clock on the wall-7am. Too early for her to be conscious. Another hour or three would be good. She curled up in her soft blue blanket and fell back asleep to the most wonderful dream of a silver haired prince rescuing a maiden from unspeakable evil and then they had the biggest wedding the kingdom had ever seen.

Four hours later, and fully awake Hanare found her way to the kitchen to grab something to munch on while she searched out Kakashi. Daisuke had returned from Suna a day before his sister and was currently snoring like a chainsaw and sprawled on the couch. He had a broken leg that the medical corps healed on his return but he was instructed to a week of rest before he went on any missions. So naturally, Hanare dropped all her weight on his leg to jump on the couch and wake him up.

He didn't even scream, much to Hanare's disappointment, but the drowsy shock on his face was priceless. He pulled his legs out from under Hanare and went back to his snoring.

Come to think of it, Hanare wasn't completely sure her brother could open any of the gates. The possibility was high. There wasn't much Daisuke didn't know how to do. Determined not to ask, the less she knew the more Kakashi had to teach her, she poked her head into the laundry room to tell her mother she was leaving and took off in search of the Jonin.

Hanare didn't want to just waltz up to his apartment so she walked aimlessly around the village for a while. When she got bored of that, she found herself in her ANBU mask and uniform heading for headquarters. As a good captain, Kakashi should be there at all times he wasn't away on missions. Not surprisingly, Hanare did not see the wolf shaped mask she sought. That left one other place she could think of.

There he was, in his usual slouch, in front of the memorial stone near training ground 3. His posture straightened a fraction when Hanare approached him.

"Yo." She greeting as cheekily as she could muster.

"Hello." He turned to face her, his eye crinkled in a smile.

"Did you forget you made a commitment to teach me?" she heard herself ask.

"No, I didn't know when you wanted to start"

"Now."

Kakashi thought for a moment, "Alright, come on." He hoped onto the branch of a tree.

"Where to?" She asked.

"I have a training area in mind."

"Why don't you train me here, on the actual training grounds?"

"Because Gai is two miles that way on ground 14 teaching his students how to walk water. If anyone opens a chakra gate in the village he will know and he will come running."

"Why is that a bad thing?"

"Just trust me on this" His voice shaking as he began to get worried.

Hanare let him off the hook and followed him through the village, over the Hokage Monument and through yet another thicket of trees. An hour later, and running faster than Hanare had intended to do for atleast the next week, they reached the end of the forest and were looking down into the rocky out crops.

"You're the one who blasted holes all over here!" Hanare came to the realisation.

"I haven't done that in years" Kakashi said looking around the canyon at the hundreds of holes here and there, varying in depth, all still having the scorching burn marks around them.

"I've passed through here a few times on missions, but I never would have imagined you were the one that left all this carnage."

"I had to develop Chidori somewhere and the trees back home weren't cutting it."

Hanare pointed at an especially wide piece of outcropping rock, "That has to be five feet thick and it has a clean hole straight through."

"I was testing it." He sounded as if he were getting ready to yawn. "Do you think you can make it up to that one, the highest elevation." He really did yawn, "It's my usual place and good for concentrating."

"You're just trying to torture me aren't you?"she said wearily.

"Could be." He drawled, "Ready?"

"How does me saying it looks like torture, mean I want to climb all the way up there?"

"You don't?''

"Ofcourse not, but I will anyway" She pouted.

Gloves cut off at the fingers were not, at all best for rock climbing. Her fingers were red and blistered by the time they reached the summit and her skin felt crispy from the scorching sun. Kakashi handed her a bottle of water and she guzzled down half of it, pouring the other half over her burnt face.

"You're bright pink" Kakashi commented sipping his own water through his mask.

"It happens, I take forever to get a tan, I just go from normal to burnt like that."

"I don't get tanned either." He shrugged looking at his pale arm.

"You don't leave much surface area available to get tanned." She said, and then quickly changing the subject, "So what do I have to do first?"

Hanare's hands started to glow a gentle green as chakra was drawn to her palms soothing the irritated skin.

"You know medical ninjutsu?" Kakashi was only half surprised.

"Barely, I had to learn how to spot certain things on the bodies of those rogue ninja that are brought back to the village, it's disgusting work by the way, and I picked up how to heal flesh wounds from the med corps."

"That could come in handy." Kakashi offered his own palms that had hardly even turned red.

Hanare took his in hers and the glow of her chakra surrounded their hands.

"I'm surprised you can't do this." She told him.

"Never learnt, plus I think it's better to prevent the injury than to heal it later."

"I heard you practically live in the hospital after every s-rank" Hanare watched him from the corner of her eyes.

"Details...Atleast I come back from those."

Hanare squeezed his hands unconsciously before letting go and with a worried smile she nodded.

Kakashi went on a long explanation on the 8 gates and their function, which Hanare knew already, then where they were located, which she also knew and finally how to open them.

"So you can open all, then?" Hanare asked at the end of his lecture, "Like Gai-san?"

"In theory, but I never got past the third gate, my body doesn't have the endurance for it." He was looking over the edge of the ridge.

"How far do you think I'll get?" Hanare asked.

"You only need to get past the first one for your jutsu to work, you won't actually be fighting with this, unless you want to. You might even be able to open all but I won't recommend it. It's incredibly dangerous, you basically tear you're body open every time you use it and after the 6th gate it's basically suicide."

"And they trust Gai-san with something like that?" That sounded nicer in her head, "I mean Gai –san is a top class ninja but he seems a bit..."

"Reckless, hyper-active, definitely too emotional," Kakashi finished her thought for her.

"Yeah, that."

"He knows what's important and what's not. And he can control it better than anyone else so you don't have to worry." Kakashi assured.

"Do you worry?" Hanare asked eyeing him sceptically.

"I suppose, but I worry about his ability to find me whenever I want to avoid him much more." He mumbled.

"Nice." Hanare remarked.

The day was passed with Hanare sitting cross legged on the hot rock, meditating, willing her chakra to break through the first gate in her brain. Kakashi went between reading his book, looking at her and looking at her from behind his book. Even though Hanare was focusing, she stole some glances at the jonin but was caught everytime, or maybe she had caught him looking, it was hard to tell.

Atleast climbing down was easier than the way up and the sun was already low in the sky by the time they reached the edge of the canyon.

"That was depressing." Hanare grumbled. She had gotten nowhere in her training and she felt a headache coming on.

"You couldn't have opened the gate on your first try." Kakashi responded all too cheerily, patting her on her head.

Hanare picked his hand off her head by his sleeve, "mmmmm"

"You're cute" Kakashi said shoving his hands into his pockets.

"Yeah when I'm depressed and miserable you thinking I'm cute." Wait, he thought she was cute, "You think I'm cute?" The butterflies in her stomach started to flutter.

"As cute as a depressed and miserable person could be. Anyhow, did you find out what Jiraiya wanted to teach you?" And just like that, the moment was gone.

"No, not yet." Hanare was sinking further into her misery, "He said to meet him tomorrow at the hot springs. YES, I know." She rolled her eyes as kakashi snickered.

"Jiraiya-sensei isn't that bad, and you could be going anywhere, he just said to meet him there." Kakashi was bubbling over with his dry humour.

Hanare jabbed him in his ribs, Hard.

"Must you do that?" Kakashi asked rubbing his side.

"You were getting too happy, wouldn't want anyone to know that you're capable of emotions, now do we."

Kakashi became silent. His mood plummeting down the ridge. He stopped walking and his eyes fell onto the back of Hanare's head. She was one step ahead of him and turned back to face him, almost knocking into his chest at their close proximity. The swift movement making her head spin.

"Do you think that," Kakashi asked slowly, his voice rough. "that I'm not capable of emotions?"

Hanare parted her lips slightly to tell him no but she was caught up in him. The way his eye was pinned to her, the way his brow furrowed, the way he was leaning ever so slightly towards her. She felt the heat radiating off his body, that wonderful heady smell that clung onto his skin. She felt as if she was being pulled towards him by some unknown force. Slowly tipping all her weight towards this man as if he was her centre of gravity. Every inch of her calling to be touched by him.

He heard that unspoken call. Kakashi extended his arms out to capture her in a loose hug. If calling it a hug was reaching. In reality, he had placed one hand on her shoulder blade and the other at her elbow to steady her.

"Hana, are you ok?" His voice was sharp.

She swallowed back the saliva that that accumulated at the back of her mouth and nodded, "Tired, I'm ok, just tired."

Kakashi bent, picked her up and carried her to the shade of a tree not too far away, where the orange glow of the low sun did not reach them. He crouched down, leaning his back against the tree and cradled Hanare on his lap. Taking out the remnants of his water, he pressed the mouth of the bottle to her lips until she drank in little sips.

"You were drifting from side to side like you were going to collapse." He said softly, worriedly.

Hanare had thought that her sudden light-headedness was due to being so close to kakashi but she was feeling disturbingly dizzy and with each sip of water her stomach threatened to heave. She pushed Kakashi's hand away and shook her head violently, not wanting to swallow a drop further. His arms tightened around her as Hanare nuzzled the side of her face to Kakashi's chest.

"My head-" she started to explain but the rest came out in a jumble of incomprehensible sounds.

His hand was on her head then, slowly massaging deep circles into it. Soothing and comforting. Hanare dozed off a few times, waking up seconds later with a start, still being held by kakashi's strong arms. Kakashi radiated protection like he did heat and Hanare welcomed both happily.

She had lost track of time in that state, but when she finally came to, it was to the sound of Kakashi conversing with another male voice. She slowly opened her eyes and her body jumped realising that she was curled up on Kakashi's lap and he was holding her snugly against him.

"Hi there." The gruff voice said. Hanare's eyes searched the dark surroundings for the owner of the voice, finally settling on a small pug at her feet. "Are you feeling ok?" it said.

Hanare's hold on Kakashi tightened. She knew certain summons could speak but she wasn't so sure she was completely awake yet or just hallucinating.

"Hanare?" Kakashi's sweet voice floated down.

She raised herself off of the ninja's chest and focused on his visible eye, "Does he usually talk?" her voice strained and low.

"Yes." Kakashi answered amused.

"Did I faint?" Hanare was having a hard time getting words out of her mouth.

"No, but you strained your chakra flow to your head. That means you did make progress in opening the first gate. I didn't think you would have gotten this far yet." Kakashi ran his gloved hand through her dark hair, combing down the side that was pressed against him. Hanare decided she liked the feeling of that.

"Yay" she breathed out wearily, letting her head fall onto Kakashi's shoulder again.

Kakashi wrapped one arm around her, the other settled on her lap.

"You smell nice" She heard herself say dreamily.

"That's me, I took a bath this morning." The pug leapt onto her lap. She scratched behind his ears getting a satisfied huff in return.

"You're so soft." Hanare smiled.

"I take alot of time to keep my coat soft and shiny, want to feel my paw?"

"Pakkun" Kakashi said in a slightly warning tone.

"What, she likes me, I can tell she wants to play and it would make her feel better."

Hanare raised her head off of Kakashi and rubbed the dog with both hands. "Pakkun, that's a nice name, did kakashi name you?"

"Yes, I was just a kid when I got him." Kakashi adjusted the Konoha forehead protector on the dog's head.

Pakkun snorted, "I got _you_," turning back to Hanare, "He was completely hopeless with out me."

"Yes completely." Kakashi drawled sarcastically. "He had to protect me so often that his first word was my name."

Through her clouded senses, Hanare picked up something coming towards them on their right, she whipped her head in that direction just as another canine appeared and settled infront of them.

"Someone's coming." The dog with sunglasses and tan fur with a white strip running from his head to his muzzle said.

"Enemy?" Pakkun asked.

The dog did an equivalent of a shrug, "Still far off, but headed this way."

"Pakkun get Urushi, you two can go, Akino stay with us and lead the way to the shortest route back to the village." Kakashi gave them their orders.

Hanare found herself being carried back to the village, bridal style, as Kakashi flitted from branch to branch. Her hands knotted at the back of his neck.

"Sorry about this." Kakashi apologised between jumps. "Safer to have left than waited to see who would have shown up."

"It's okay." Hanare said into his shirt. She felt her face flush and where Kakashi touched her, little fireworks of Goosebumps went off on her skin.

They reached the village much too fast, faster than it had taken them to leave. Kakashi let her down onto her shaky legs, putting an arm around her to keep her up. He was going to take her right up to her house, but Hanare protested, just saying to trust her on this one. When Hanare gained back some of her balance, she pulled away from kakashi grasping onto his arm, trying not to fall over at the end of her street.

"You'll be ok, this happened to me too when I was learning how to do it, make sure you eat and go straight to sleep, you need to rest." Kakashi worried over her like a mother hen.

"I will, I will." Hanare was busy deeply inhaling his scent to pay attention to him saying it for the tenth time.

"Are you sure you don't want to go the hospital just in case?" He asked.

"Yessssss." Hanare was getting irritated at him for continuously breaking her concentration on the wonderful feeling of their hands together.

"What if Akino stays with you the night, he's the best spotter in the village, if you feel sick he can get Daisuke or me or uhh-" Seeing the look on her face that said 'absolutely not' he changed tactics, "What about Pakkun or Ai, she's the only female ninkin I have."

"Kakashi" she breathed out exasperated.

"Alright, but promise me you will get some rest." Kakashi held out his pinky finger in front of her.

A tired laugh escaped her lips, "Somehow I think this is more binding than any legal contract for you now." She hooked her finger with his.

Kakashi bent and kissed the tip of her pinky with the soft material of his mask. "Definately."

Hanare followed his actions and touched her lips to the finger twisted around hers.

"I don't know if I imagined this, but you asked me a question before I went insane."

Kakashi just look down at her mutely.

"If you're capable of emotions?" She wanted confirmation but dove into the next part before she lost her nerve. "Of course you are. I would know, just tonight you were, Kind, sweet, concerned, you took care of me, you acted like a immature 12 year old around Pakkun and then a leader when you had to. And right now you're blushing, so you're probably embarrassed."

Kakashi stared at her for a few moments. Not sure how to respond. He managed a simple, "Thank you."

Hanare's mouth perked up into an impish smile and she shrugged, letting go of his arm. She seemed a million times less exhausted as she patted Akino.

"I'll see you around SENSEI," She took her first step away from them, "Tomorrow Jiraiya-sama is going to take his turn at trying to kill me, don't want to disappoint him."

Kakashi watched her until she was safely through her front door. He still felt the lingering kiss on his hand and only wished he could feel that sensation all over his body.

"You love her." The tan-furred dog at his feet stated.

Great, his ninkin had only been around for an hour or two and they noticed his inner most feelings in that space of time.

"Shut up." Kakashi turned on his heels pacing a few steps away, "Do you want dinner?"

"The pack is already at your place." Akino disappeared with an audible *poof* leaving kakashi to slowly walk back to his apartment to his waiting ninkin.

* * *

The next day Hanare was sure her heart skipped a beat seeing Kakashi waiting outside Konoha's hot springs. He lifted his hand in greeting as she approached him.

"I wanted to see how you were feeling." He explained.

"All better." Hanare beamed up a warm smile.

"Jiraiya already went in. I figured I would stay and er...see what he wanted to show you."

"Thank you." Hanare said dramatically. She did not want to be left alone with that man in a place like this.

Kakashi found him, not surprisingly, peeking into the women's area from the male side. It took an additional 10 minutes to rip Jiraiya from his spot and haul him out into the lobby.

"Hanare-chan, you look ravishing today." Jiraiya complimented.

Taking off her kimono style top in the steamy building was a bad idea, but she was boiling in it and her burgundy under vest did cover everything that needed to be covered, if it was a bit too fitting in certain areas.

"So where are we going?" Hanare asked turning for the exit.

"Wait, wait wait, I wanted to meet here for a reason, we just need a bit more privacy." Jiraiya said completely serious.

Hanare shot Kakashi a look but he was busy looking suspiciously at Jiraiya who was at the counter asking for a private steam room.

The sanin lead them down the hall, Kakashi fell in line behind Hanare and took his place next to her in the room. Then Jiraiya proceeded to strip off his forehead protector and shirt. The other two in the room cringed and hid behind their hands.

"What the hell?" Hanare peeked through a slit in her fingers and burst out in a fit of hysterical laughter.

Every muscle in his body was bulging, defined and solid as a rock. Almost obnoxiously so. He came straight out of a body builder's magazine. He had left his pants on but even his waist was thick and muscular, with the skin almost stretched to its limit over his sculpted abdominals. His broad shoulders balanced out his frame and he had the same pattern of faded silvery scars as kakashi on his torso.

Hanare felt Kakashi's nonplussed eyes on her and she bit down so hard on her lip she tasted blood. One look at kakashi's confused state had Hanare in stitches again. How did he not find an almost 50 year old pervert with a body like _that_ not the most hilarious thing on the planet?

"It's just the reaction I get when women see all of this." Jiraiya said cockily flexing his muscles; Hanare was kneeling on the ground, holding her sides laughing at that.

"So you're saying women normally laugh at you when they see you naked?" Kakashi sounded prude.

Hanare was gasping and wiping her eyes a few moments later and few moments after that, took kakashi to the corner of the steam filled room to share the source of her giddiness. He smiled, put a hand to his mouth to choke back his laugh, then shook his head and directed Hanare back to where Jiraiya sat in all his glory.

"Now. You have gotten used to the sight of this. So this jutsu, I have recently perfected it." He began weaving hand signs.

"Jiraiya, all of that for this, I thought it was something serious." Hanare didn't have to look up to see Kakashi's eye roll. He had managed to relay it through his voice.

...and Jiraiya disappeared.

"That is serious" Hanare inspected around Jiraiya. "I can just barely feel your chakra but I can't see you at all."

"What do you mean recently perfected?" Kakashi continued to interject, "I copied that off of you years ago, actually sensei said you had been using that since you were a child to get into the wo-oh..uh"

Kakashi looked like he was suffocating for no reason but as expected Jiraiya appeared, his arm over kakashi in a head lock.

"Well I recently perfected it you idiot." He let go of the copy-ninja.

Kakashi started to say something but decided against it, choosing to rub his wounded neck instead.

Jiraiya explained the Jutsu and showed her the hand signs. It was simple to do, but all the mist in the room made it difficult to match the surroundings. He then explained that was why he wanted to do it here. Kakashi gave her tips and did the invisibility jutsu along with her. In a little while Hanare had disappeared completely into the steam.

Kakashi was relaying Hanare's progress the day before on opening the first gate, when inspiration struck the old pervert.

"You can copy her technique and open the first gate! Try it out and see if it would really work!" Jiraiya brought one fist down onto this other palm.

Kakashi watched Hanare and she shrugged, "It wouldn't hurt."

He moved his Hitai-ate up revealing his activated Sharingan. Kakashi made a single hand seal and 2 second later, with an open first gate he said, "Go ahead and I'll copy it."

Hanare shuffled her feet, "Ahhh, this isn't a jutsu I weave with my hands. I use my eyes."

There was a resounding astonishment between the two men. Then kakashi stepped closer to her, "Tell me when you've started. If you look at the Sharingan too early, you'll get caught in the genjutsu."

Hanare felt the tingle go up her spine having kakashi right there, getting ready to stare into her eyes. After everything that happened yesterday she thought she would have been accustomed to him by now. But no, the tingle kept expanding to other regions.

"Focus on my right eye... now." Hanare directed him as she started shifting her eyes, moulding her chakra with their movement.

"Get closer boy, you don't want to mess this up." Jiraiya pushed forcefully on his back causing him to smack into Hanare. She lost her footing on the slippery floor and Kakashi fell flush against her. And then his covered lips were locked with hers.

Their bodies were in perfect alignment, allowing Hanare to feel the significant bulge pressed between her legs. Was that always like that or did it just...happen. He felt her soft breasts being pushed against his chest. Kakashi's forearm was at the right side of her head, supporting his weight while she had no idea where her arms were sprawled out, all her attention being captured by the swirling Sharingan and the lips pressed against hers.

Her left eye was still taking in the situation but her right was pulled into her jutsu and she saw the column and scrolls that represented her mind. Kakashi's weight shifted off of her, their lips broke apart and she dispelled her jutsu. Kakashi sat next to her, his arms braced on the floor a minute longer. He faced Hanare, whose body was too shocked to even blush. Her face was slack and her lips parted at the same degree as it was when they were met with his.

Jiraiya looked up over the edge of his note pad, which he was scribbling on and giggling frantically.

"So did it work?" He eagerly asked.

"I saw inside my own mind, all my memories and thoughts were there, I just had to look and I could find any point in my life." Kakashi was mystified.

"It was like a book, and you could decide to change the story if you wanted." Hanare finally coming out of her stupor, smiled shyly at kakashi.

With both eyes uncovered, it was easier to tell that he was smiling. The way he did it reminded Hanare of the sweet twelve year old boy who had saved her many years ago. He rubbed the back of his head and nodded.

"Now to see if you can manipulate with it. Kakashi, go into my mind and erase what I'm telling you now and add something to what I ate for breakfast this morning."

He slowly got off the floor and approached Jiraiya. He matched the older man's gaze and a few minutes later moved to sit next to him on the bench.

"What did you eat for breakfast, Jiraiya-sama?" Kakashi asked.

He man looked confused then said very slowly as if unsure, "I ate all the pages of my notepad."

Kakashi's eyes crinkled again and he slipped his Hitai-ate to cover his Sharingan. Hanare found herself smiling on the floor.

"I didn't really do that, did I?" Jiraiya sounded nauseous.

"Your notepad is right in your hands, what do you think?"

"It works." Hanare whispered.

Jiraiya was suddenly in front of her, eyes popping out of his head. Hanare looked down and saw her boots, as well as a good portion of her thighs were exposed between the slits of her skirt. She shot up and slapped Jiraiya across his face.

"You were asking for it." Kakashi said matter-of-factly.

"Bu-bu-bu." Jiraiya's lip quivered.

"Suck it up, you really need to start looking at women your own age." Hanare lectured, her finger threatening to poke his eye out. "Now that we're done, Origato Jiraiya-sama. I need some fresh air."

Hanare let herself out the door, Kakashi was on her heels as she left the entrance to the hot springs.

"Hana!" He called.

She turned back, their kiss now fully registering, her face resembling a tomato, her strength draining out of her limbs.

"Ah, ammm," Kakashi tripped over his words, "We should...meet up later...or tomorrow, to practise more...so you can open the first gate."

The unintentional kiss was something kakashi wasn't going to discuss she realised, but he acknowledged it. That was obvious by his fidgety behaviour. It was adorable.

"Ok, first thing tomorrow. Meet me at the cenotaph." Hanare offered. She had to hold herself back from pecking him on his cheek as he agreed and went back into the hot springs.

* * *

If Hanare had any hopes of a lazy evening at home, they were spontaneously sent up in flames as soon as she walked into her house and was ushered back out by her mother. She was towing Daisuke behind her and said that since both of them are so rarely home at the same time, they needed to get some errands out of the way that could only be done together. Namely furniture shopping.

So what if her bed would creek every now and then when she rolled over, she liked it. It was familiar and comfortable and most importantly, wouldn't cost them a fortune to replace. Her mother had rather extravagant taste as it was.

Examining every sample and going through the order catalogues, Daisuke still didn't care and Hanare, as picky as her mother, had gotten into several fights with said woman. The pushy sales clerk staring them into submission was as uncomfortable as having a shuriken sticking out of your back. Hours later, they left the store still cross and without any replacement beds. Now if only that was the only furniture store in the village. Unfortunately, being the Village Hidden in The Leaves implied those leaves to be attached to trees, and those trees provided an insufferable source of lumber for craftsmen in the village.

Hanare, her mother and brother were headed to the next store when passing in front of the convenience store, the door opened and a large, brown haired man bumped into Daisuke.

"Tenzo-kun?"

"Oh, Hanare-chan, good evening!" Tenzo accepted his fallen bag from Daisuke.

"That's all you eat?" she peered into his scanty bag.

"No, I just had to pick up a few things. Hey I know you." Tenzo eyes fixed on Daisuke.

"My mother and my brother, Daisuke. Oh and this is Tenzo, he was on the team I had my last mission with." Hanare introduced.

"You look familiar too, but I can't remember from where." Daisuke tilted his head.

"Yes we know, you know every Jonin in the village, can we move on. Oh My Goodness, TENZO!" Hanare took in the sight of her savoir, "You can make any type of furniture right?"

"I guess." He answered not knowing where this was going.

"We need three new beds and we can't find any that we like. But you can make whatever we want right? Right?!" Hanare was almost shaking with joy.

"I...uh...guess"

"Hanare, don't bother him, you can find your own furniture like everybody else. You just have to stop being so stubborn about it." Her mother cut in.

"But, we can get any type you like and we won't have to go from store to store, its excruciating." Hanare pleaded.

"No."

"Mommyyyyy, really, we'll pay him the same as if we bought it out of the store."

"No."

"Why not?"

"I want to see what else it has, what if I see something that I never thought about and like it better than anything else. The next time both of you are buying furniture will be for your own houses when you get married. You might as well pick out your own beds while you can."

Hanare groaned, this would go on forever if she let it. Daisuke and Tenzo stood on the sidelines watching the conversation silently. Tenzo was surprised that the famed Tigress of the Hidden Leaf, the one who would soon be Head of a sect of ANBU could be such a...well child with her mother.

"It really wouldn't be any trouble. And I could use the practise with the fine details of my work." Tenzo said to their mother.

"That's very nice of you but I don't want to give my lazy children an easy way out of doing this the proper way." She said. Daisuke and Hanare visibly deflated.

"It's just a bed, mother." Daisuke tried to say as seriously as he could but the exasperation in his voice came though.

"How about I go with you and look at what you like and then you can tell me exactly how to make it for you. I can make it at a better quality than any you would buy and mine would last significantly longer."

Their mother refused but after a long persuasion from Tenzo, she finally agreed.

"You really are useless." Hanare shot daggers with her eyes, "the point of this was to get us out of going into every store in Konoha."

"You really just made work for yourself." Daisuke put in.

"Honestly, shopping with her is the reason both of us are mentally disturbed." Hanare whispered over.

"That's exaggerating but she has a point." Daisuke said.

Tenzo started to wonder what exactly he had gotten himself into.

Two hours later, Hanare managed to pull Tenzo into the ice-cream store while her mother followed Daisuke into the weapons inventory to place an order.

"Akiyama-san is really nice, you just said all of that to scare me didn't you?" Tenzo pointed his mint ice-cream cone at her.

"You, my friend, have nerves of steel." Hanare unwrapped her supersized Popsicle.

"Or I just like her, she's nice."

Hanare pressed her lips together trying to hide the smile on her face.

"What?" The wood user asked.

"She doesn't like you."

Tenzo looked like a kicked puppy so Hanare explained, "Ok, well she probably likes you, it's just that you're a ninja and a pretty good one too."

Tenzo was still lost.

Hanare let out an awkward sigh, "She thinks you like me, or I like you. Either way it's her worse nightmare for me to be with a shinobi. She hopes I'll marry a civilian become a doctor or a housewife or something."

"Uhh.." Tenzo was shocked silent.

"My life, the woman is the best interrogator I have ever met and that includes Ibiki. She's probably torturing Daisuke right now for information he doesn't have."

"If she's that good then why does she not want you to be a ninja?" Tenzo only then noticed his ice-cream was dripping down his hand.

"Oh, she's not a ninja, she's just disturbingly good at getting what she wants out of _anyone_." Hanare licked her Popsicle. "I had to get my talent from somewhere, plus getting away with anything in my house had me developing my stealth from birth."

Something about hearing that her mother or anyone for that matter thought there was more than friendship between them had Tenzo feeling funny, like his stomach was doing backflips inside of him. He never been in any romantic involvements in his life and this had him thinking. His thinking was interrupted by the way Hanare was devouring her popsicle. She kept swirling her tongue, and Tenzo realised she had a rather long tongue, at the tip of it, letting go with an audible *pop*. It had a lemon base with swirls of cherry, grape and lime and Hanare sucked at the side of it, tasting each, saying that by the time her mouth froze over all the flavours tasted the same.

He felt a twitch in his pants the same moment he opened his mouth and blurted, "Will you go on a date with me?"

* * *

_**So, let me just say up front that I doubt I will get a chance to update on time. I'm going to try to have a story out every week but I have some very, very important exams coming up and I haven't begun to study. So freaking out mode enabled. **_

_**I am blowing up because I can't wait to get to certain points in this fic, still waiting to hear more feedback on keeping this teen friendly or not, and plans for a new story and cramming. **_

_**Thank you to all my readers, I hope you liked this chapter and I'll try my hardest to get some more out of my head asap! **_


	9. Chapter 9

Tenzo was sweet. He was polite and good natured. He was intelligent, could be funny. He was one of the best ninja in the village, arguably the best ANBU agent. He had the blood line limit of the First Hokage and therefore his skills could be limitless. He had a tragic past, being taken as a baby, an orphan, by a mad Sanin and experimented on, being left for dead but miraculously survived. He was good looking, had a strong body, anyone would feel safe with him. Tenzo could be powerful and intimidating. Tenzo had an air of mystery for anyone willing to notice. Tenzo wasn't even his real name.

There was speculation whether even he knew his real name. The Hokage assigned him a new one for each position he was given. He had been known as Tenzo for years though and only gave up the name when he went on long term assignments. On mission reports his name was not needed, they would just write the symbol "wood" on the name place. Tenzo was interesting.

Having to let him down was not easy.

Hanare almost said yes, not wanting to hurt him. But Tenzo was not Kakashi. And Hanare had long ago given away her heart to the skinny silver haired boy who had carried her on his back and given her a moment of happiness, until her old sensei had shown up and taken her back to the training facility. In retrospect, Kakashi probably didn't deserve her heart for just that. He had just been in the right place at the right time when she needed someone to be there for her. He was just Kakashi. And Hanare found herself in love with everything that was just Hatake Kakashi.

"What the hell is going on?" Hanare thought, "First I kiss kakashi and on the very same day I get asked out by Tenzo."

Hanare had never been asked out before, except for the creepers on the street, but that didn't count. She had never rejected anyone before so she had no idea what do to when Tenzo had asked for a date. It was awkward; she said she was sort of interested in someone else. He had laughed it off. Very awkwardly. He proved how sweet he was by saying it was just an idea that popped into his head and that he wished Hanare good luck with the other person. That if he ever hurt her, Tenzo would personally castrate him, whoever he was.

Hanare guessed Tenzo had thoughts of castrating his mentor more than once, with the way kakashi always picked on him. So that thought wasn't too far from the truth. Also, the way Tenzo looked like he had just remembered something excruciatingly obvious sold him out that he most likely knew Hanare had a thing for kakashi.

* * *

The next day of training passed without incident, she didn't even faint this time. Kakashi perched in a tree reading his pornography and Hanare trying to open the first gate. Team Gai was out on a mission so it was safe to stay in the village for the next few days. The only interruption they had was an ANBU messenger bringing a scroll for Kakashi, but with a curt nod from the captain, the messenger with the abstract painted mask departed.

It was hard to look at kakashi. Hanare had felt his lips...among other things, on her and wanted to feel them again. She felt guilty about what happed with Tenzo and wanted to tell him but couldn't find a way too. As it was they weren't anything to each other that would matter if someone else asked her on a date or not. Kakashi probably wouldn't care.

By the next day, Hanare felt the gate metaphorically budge. She fainted that time and Kakashi carried her right up to her door because everyone was out that day. The third day was interrupted by a very large, very hairy Sanin. He was leaving the village again and asked Hanare if she had done her research on cuddly poops supposed family.

"I did, the family name came up, all the relatives they mentioned checked out, good honest family too. I only wish I could go pay them a visit and make sure it really them. The names match up but I would like to go make sure the people match up."

"I'll do that on my way out of fire country. You seem to be busy." Jiraiya handed her a mission scroll. "Hokage wants to see you now." He added to kakashi. A three way goodbye followed and Hanare went to get her ANBU gear, Kakashi to the Kage tower and Jiraiya over the wall of the village, still refusing to use the gates.

* * *

Hanare had been gone four days. Not long by ANBU standards, but she was supposed to be back after three. She was on a simple retrieval mission, no real danger. Yet kakashi yearned to go with her, something inside of him missed being close to her and he knew he would be on edge until she returned. He could actually feel impulses surging through him making him shake with anticipation even though he had been piled up with work sorting through candidates for new ANBU members on request of the Hokage. Why the Hokage wanted to strengthen the darker side of Konoha's shinobi had something to do with his long conversation with Jiraiya. Kakashi didn't want to think too much about it, he had other things to concentrate on right now.

He was at the memorial stone; his eyes easily fell on his best friend's name. His gaze was so used to staring at the spot he didn't even have to think to find it. Then immediately next to it was Rin's name, that one especially caused a sharp stab to his heart. Three rows down, at the right edge was sensei and Kushina. Passing his eyes over the stone he could name a dozen or so more people he had once known. He wondered if he was just bad luck. Everyone he loved was gone, completely gone. He didn't even have one grave to visit, even their bodies were gone. Well, there was his parents, but he only visited there once a year. The emptiness inside him expanded.

No, he wasn't going go down that road again, not until he did this.

The wind was picking up, Kakashi smelt it. In approximately 47minutes it would rain. He had stood here in the rain before, he just hoped it wouldn't break his concentration. He sat crossed legged infront of the monument, briefly touching those four names before tugging his head band up. Hanare's jutsu would only work with his Sharingan. Hanare...

His shoulders relaxed, she always filled that emptiness. And he did love her, she made him happy, it had been a while since he could have said he was purely happy. After he did this he would have to tell them about that kiss. Hmmm, when did that smile get on his face? Kakashi massaged it away with one hand. He didn't want to let himself get attached again. History might repeat itself and he would have another regret etched onto that stone.

Ok, focus. He was pulled into his mind then. What should he start with? Maybe something recent.

Hanare sitting below him, her luxuriously long eyelashes brushing the top of her cheeks. Deep in concentration. Then Hanare, cradled ontop of him, arms wrapped around his midsection. The crisp, calming scent of her shampoo wafted up to his nose. Her cheek nuzzling into his chest. He heard his heart racing in his ears. Hanare always there, peacefully sleeping, when he awoke in the Land of Clouds. That one night, sleeping next to her, feeling that wonderful dip in the mattress where she lay. Walking with Hanare, discovering her love of reading, debating, discussing with her, starting to fall in love. Seeing a child at the corner of his eye walking through the streets of Konoha. He had seen that girl before, that face, that hair, he knew what her voice would sound like even though she hadn't said a word.

Then, that day. The first day.

Going back to the village after scouting. Seeing that little girl crying, yet still resolutely walking to her unknown destination. He had approached her. She was lost. He took her up on his back, determined to help her. He was uncharacteristically kind to her. Something about this little girl, those unfathomable brown eyes filled with tears. They would have looked alot better happy. Maybe that was why he did it. It just felt right.

Only when the old man appeared did kakashi realise how open he was being with this girl. He was getting lost in talking to her, looking at the clouds. He wasn't on a mission then, wasn't a chunin, wasn't a ninja who had already claimed lives at the age of twelve. He was just a kid, just kakashi. All too quickly did he let the girl on his back dismount at rush to that man. He jumped a few yards away feeling his insides flutter, then with one last look he teleported out of sight. His head as light as a feather.

Kakashi found himself looking at the unopened scroll of his memories again. He was at loss. He had always felt guilty not remembering that first day completely. But now he had just relived it. Every detail clear in his mind. That first memory triggered a domino effect and Hana flooded his thoughts. Was he crazy or did it seem like Hana was, dare he say it...flirting, with him sometimes.

His heart had stopped. One part of him was as excited as the day the third Hokage called him a Genius for graduating the Academy after only one year, the other part didn't want to assume what it might mean. He dispelled the jutsu, closing Obito's Sharingan.

The sky was dark now, the place humid and hot. 25 minutes till the rain. That was enough time. His eye focused on his Sensei's name, his friend, older brother, hell Minato-sensei was a father to him longer than the six years he had with his real father. He would have been a great father. It was a tragedy Naruto would never know. Kakashi felt as if he had stolen that opportunity from Minato's biological son.

He sighed, breathing in the moist air. He would go back there next. The day Naruto was born, the day the Kyuubi escaped from kushina and ripped the village apart.

He, like most shinobi in the village, felt responsible for not being able to stop it. But he was the one who should have been fighting alongside his Sensei. The only one who regretted it more than himself was probably Jiraiya, who wasn't even around when his Village and Student needed him. Logically, both knew if Minato could not stop it, they didn't have a chance, but maybe if all three were there, plus Sarutobi-sama things would have been different.

Replaying it back in his mind, it was more embarrassing than anything. Being the only ANBU member being detained in that unbreakable barrier. Not doing anything but waiting out the fight. He really needed to stop wearing ANBU gear around the village too. Gai was being exceptionally submissive looking back on it. He saw that Kakashi _knew_ what was going on and wasn't doing anything about it. That was a far cry from Gai not knowing what was going on and not doing anything about it. The man must have really trusted Kakashi's judgement. Kakashi wished that trust hadn't developed so early. When he had figured out Naruto's delivery had gone horribly wrong he should have done something. They should have done something.

Kakashi felt the rain hit his shoulders. Icy drops speared through his clothes and washed over his skin. He was going to get a cold but he couldn't stop now. It was Rin's turn.

* * *

Hanare reached back to the village at the height of the downpour. Konoha's rainy season had begun. Not that she was complaining, she loved the rain. It's just that after another solo mission, without an umbrella in heavy, soaking wet ANBU gear, water squishing in her boots, was not a pleasant feeling. At the gates she waved to Kotesu and Izume. Even with her mask, they knew it was her; they seemed to know all of Konoha's secrets being involved in every sect of the village. She wondered if they had gotten together as yet. Her former school mates had always been exceptionally close, even back then. They did make a cute couple if anything.

Speaking of which, she had to find kakashi. He had tormented her thoughts relentlessly since she had left his side four days ago. She fantasized about him making a grand entrance like he had before. When she was half way back to the village all fantasies were given up. It was 1pm. Kakashi would be at the cenotaph. But in this rain maybe even he, was cowering under his warm blankets, sipping hot cocoa.

But this was Kakashi. Never hurt to check. She did have time to pick up an umbrella, a bright green one with orange swirls on it, and headed for the monument.

And there he was. Sitting motionless. His hair drooping down, heavy with rain. Hanare walked straight up to him and sheltered them both with the very, Gai-like umbrella before she noticed that his normal eye was closed and Sharingan open, moving sporadically. Well, not that sporadically. He was using her cranial infiltration jutsu. The poor guy probably didn't even notice he was in the worst thunderstorm of the year. Hanare loosed her long hair behind her, wringing out some of the water. She placed her tiger mask at her feet and pulled down the cloth mask that reached up covering her nose. Good, now that she could breath, it was a marvellous occasion to blatantly stare at Kakashi without him noticing.

He was so pale. His skin soo smooth. She knew the exact shape of those lips under his mask, by sight and touch. Was more water leaving his eyes than what was steaming in? He was...crying. Hanare's breath caught in her throat. She was suddenly aware of every deep beat of her heart, every drop of rain that beat against the umbrella. He was. He was crying, looking back at something and, crying. She stood entranced by the sight of him. Only when her eyes became irritated she remembered she had to blink.

He wouldn't want anyone seeing him like that. Cool, aloof, calculating Kakashi would not. Yet Hanare could not tear herself away from him. She took slow breaths, not daring to make even the smallest sound. If she was staying she needed to find something to stare at besides the copy ninja.

The stone infront of her provided the answer. She found some of the recently added names, she knew two of them from ANBU. She noticed another kunoichi she had gone to the academy with. But soon, she ran out of familiar people. What were Kakashi's teammate's names? There was the fourth hokage. Namikaze Minato. That's his sensei. Then there was the Uchiha. Uchiha, Uchiha, Uchiha Obito! There it was. Now the pretty medic, she would be somewhere after Uchiha Obito but before Namikaze Minato. Rin. That was it. But it was right after Obito's name. They had been killed about a year apart. No way would they be right next to each other. But, Hanare thought, it had happened during the third great shinobi war, the stone probably wasn't updated that often. Why not put team mates next to each other if given the chance.

Hanare reached out and tapped the two names with her index and middle finger.

"He's remembering you two I bet." She thought as kakashi's breathing picked up. Hanare moved her fingers away but stayed leaning towards the stone.

After a whole minute Kakashi cleared his throat.

"What would you do if you were captured," Kakashi's voice was strained and raspy "And you had to erase all your memories, would you forget everyone that was special to you?"

Hanare glanced in his direction without repositioning herself. She couldn't see him but she didn't want to turn around yet.

"I used to think about that," She began softly, "But it doesn't seem like such a hard choice, it would be to protect our village, so I would do it. Plus, I don't have to erase everything. I could choose to remember most people, just not everything about them."

She could not take it any more. She felt her body turning and she faced kakashi. His Head band was covering his Sharingan but his normal eye was tinged with red, already starting to puff up.

"I kept a diary, alot of talking to myself basically. I wrote all the important things that had happened to me in it. But after all the failures at perfecting the jutsu I lost track of updating it. I guess now I have to dig it up and add a few things." Hanare smiled gently towards him. It was all she could do. She wanted to reach out and touch him, but that wouldn't heal whatever memory had hurt him so much.

"Write about me in it okay." Kakashi whispered. There was something in that. Something pleading touched with a hint of hope and longing. His eye was slited almost closed as he looked up at her.

She dropped to her knees, her metal shin guards knocking against the pebbles on the ground.

"I already did." The hand that wasn't holding up the umbrella reached out and hovered at his swelling eye. He closed it completely as her palm glowed a gentle green and she channelled the fluid building up there, away.

"When we were kids and you helped me find my way was, is a very important memory to me. I don't know if you remember, well you can go back and remember now even if you don't. But that day I was crying, and you told me about the clouds. That whenever I feel sad or alone I could look up there and in vision whatever I wanted, because clouds change their form and they could be anything that I needed." Hanare removed her palm and kakashi's sad eye focused on her.

"After that day, I started to look at the sky and see what I wished for all the time. I even thought about you." Hanare felt her face flush, "and when that didn't work, I turned to books. If I couldn't get lost with my head in the clouds, I got lost with my mind in a good story."

"That's how I started reading all the time too." Kakashi sounded infinitely better. Hanare's smile widened.

"Thank you for giving me your jutsu." Kakashi said.

"Thank you for giving me the clouds." Hanare could think of a million other things to say to him but she just continued to smile until he matched hers with one of his own.


	10. Chapter 10

Today was the day.

Today Hanare was going to profess her love to the one and only Hatake Kakashi. The famed White Fang's genius son, the Copy ninja, the only Sharingan user that wasn't an Uchiha.

For some time now, she concluded that he also had feelings towards her. What those feelings were she could only guess, and so, the only thing she could do was ask. She needed to ask. There was now THAT hanging over her head and she couldn't do anything about it without knowing from him.

Their schedules kept them running for three weeks straight. That was three weeks of solo missions for Hanare and three weeks of strategising and paper work for kakashi. The circumstances did not leave much room for them to spend alone together. The most face time they had was sitting across from each other during a five hour ANBU meeting, and even then their faces were hidden behind their masks.

There were a few odd minutes Hanare managed to steal with the object of her many fantasies.

Like after the five hour meeting, Kakashi had suddenly appeared next to her. She was so groggy and numb by the end of it, she hadn't realised it was Kakashi standing next to her and missed the first sentence he said. That didn't last long anyway, Homura-sama came and ushered him away, but not before Kakashi's arm brushed very deliberately down Hanare's back, making her breath catch. Being in a tiny room filled with the elite of Konoha's elite proved to be a horrible place for such action as _everyone_ noticed.

...

Then, there was the incident at the end of that very jam-packed first week.

Hanare had been on five missions in seven days, three S-ranks and two A-ranks, without any partner she might add. She was leaving the headquarters intelligence sect after a morning of rummaging through old files, to hopefully find a shred of data on her next mission, when she saw Kakashi. He was seated on the floor of the ANBU library, his back against the long S-shaped couch, milling through a sea of documents.

"They really need to get you an office. _Captain_." Hanare approached him wearily.

"And make my whereabouts easy to pin point?" He ran a hand through his hair that was even more messy than usual. "I don't think so."

It was true. If he did have an office it would make him an easy target as every enemy would know where he would be most of the time. Though the building directly behind the Kage tower was huge, the ANBU who occupied it didn't exactly have offices. The intelligence division, which took up half the floor space, was only due to the numerous filing cabinets and vaults that kept all the information about everything on the face of the earth. The remaining half of the building was designated to holding cells, interrogation rooms and strategising quarters.

Being in ANBU was anything but a nice, easy desk job and the leader of such an organisation did not have the need to sit in a chair all day giving out orders. Plus, that would give him an excuse to lock his office door and read porn all day instead of having to do any actual work.

Hanare moved her painted Tiger mask off her face a fraction so that Kakashi could see the tongue being stuck out at him.

"Have you been practising?" Kakashi asked stretching his legs out over his work on the floor.

"Well...no." Hanare was embarrassed that she hadn't tried to open the chakra gate since that last time with Kakashi but she had all those missions and no time in between.

"It's ok, a break is good every once in a while."

"Break." Hanare breathed, "Do you know the week I've had?"

"Well I did put you on those two assignments." Kakashi scratched his head, absentmindedly.

"Yoshi-taicho put me on three more in-between those two, I was contemplating running off to the beach and saying my mission took ten times longer than expected." She huffed.

Kakashi just waved down her idea, "All your missions were relatively local if you did five in one week, it would take more effort to get to the ocean than get back here."

"Well some deserted, exotic waterfall around here then."

"Erotic? I don't know about that, but there is a really nice one at the northern border of the fire country." Kakashi suggested blandly.

"EX-O-TIC and you mean the Valley of the End?" Hanare racked her semi-swollen brain for any other.

"Hn, there's ok too. It has another one Minato-sensei took my team to, but it's a whole days journey to get to."

"We should go someti-No, NOW." Hanare decided, "I'm serious, I don't want another mission that ends with the instructions to a suicide jutsu if I'm already too dead to fight back."

"You'll be alright."

"I'm rolling my eyes at you." She dead-panned behind her mask.

"I'm sure you are." Kakashi took the opportunity to scratch his cheek.

"What are you doing anyway?" Hanare didn't even bother to try to read the hundreds of documents at her feet.

"You know, the usual." Kakashi drawled, "You're welcome to assist me before I find something more interesting to read."

"I'm leaving tomorrow on yet another mission, I have my own problems." She took one last glance at Kakashi's slumped figure before her and started to walk away.

"Good luck" Kakashi called after her.

"You too." She sang back at him.

...

Hanare emerged from the library under the Hokage building and was surprised by how dark the sky was. She didn't spend that much time there, did she? It seemed to have been only two or three hours, but somehow instead of being 4pm, it was close to 9.

Ultimately, her search found nothing. If the Third hadn't come in and offered to tell her about the Ruokiumoi Village, she would be leaving tomorrow on a blind mission.

It was nice, though. He had found her half way up the wall of books, hanging on by one hand as the other pulled and replaced history books as rapidly as she read the title. When Hanare saw him, she jumped down and landed on one knee to bow before the village's leader. He smiled and asked her what she was looking for, then ordered tea for both of them, before starting to impart all the information on the Village that was supposedly destroyed in the last war.

The Hokage seemed to know every citizen of the leaf village, and even more so the ANBU that he had handpicked to serve him. They talked about the chances of getting her brother, Daisuke, to finally join ANBU, then on how that was like getting Jiraiya to take over for him. They talked about missions, the tea, the weather and various other forms of small talk. It didn't seem to take up that much time and when the Hokage finally dismissed her, she felt like she had just had Sunday tea with her grandpa. She even completely forgot that he would be the one deciding on her promotion or not. She lost her opportunity to impress her boss it seemed.

Hanare stretched her arms up, relieving the kinks in her back from sitting in that one position for so long. She still had to go back to the library at ANBU HQ and recheck a book the Third said might help. Her stomach protested though. She hadn't eaten a full meal since breakfast and wanted to gorge herself. She decided against it being so close to HQ, she might as well go and get it over with.

The building was as deserted as it usually was, only a few members leaving or returning from missions, some with captives, some with bloody armour. What she didn't expect to find was Kakashi still seated where she had left him seven hours ago. He definitely hadn't moved.

Though, at present, an extraordinarily energetic Maito Gai was bouncing on the balls of his feet challenging him to a 500 metre one legged race. That was odd for many reasons. But the one that stood out was that Gai was there, in the building. Only members with the ANBU seal/tattoo could actually enter HQ, or bring others in with them.

Kakashi wasn't oblivious to this either when he asked with bored curiosity, "How do you keep getting in here?"

Hanare stepped out from behind the door frame, "Umm, hi."

Both Gai and Kakashi glanced up at her. "Don't let me interrupt, I just needed a book."

"Gai, _Hanare-chan_ here, is trying to open the Kaimon, maybe you can give her some tips." Kakashi said all too cheerily.

"Hanare-chan?" Gai stroked his chin thoughtfully till a visible light bulb went on over his head, "Yes! You are Konoha's Tirgress! I, Konoha's Green Beast will be most honoured to give Konoha's Tigress some youthful pieces of advice on how to master the gates! YOSH! It will be most helpful for both of us as I intend to tea-"

He cut his sentence abruptly short and was the picture of guilt as he darted his eyes from Kakashi to the floor and back.

"Gai, the advice?" Kakashi urged on, ignoring the other mans failed cover up.

Gai lunged for Hanare and took her hands in his and began the second longest conversation she had had that day. Thirty minutes in, she excused herself, well, she said she had a mission to prep for and thanked Gai sincerely and then kakashi with the most thinly veiled annoyance she had ever portrayed in her life and teleported the hell out of there.

...

A few days and a completed mission later Hanare found herself back in the library of the ANBU headquarters. She had learnt a few things about this supposedly dead village, and with the consent of the Third Hokage, she went to add them to the history books. Even though now they were more dead than supposedly dead, intel was intel.

Kakashi had relocated from the library floor to one of the intelligence division's rooms. He even had a chair and a desk for the time he occupied it. Hanare passed the door that led to him as she left the building. She passed by it again that night when she was called on another mission. The light was still on. He really was working hard these days. If he was there all day, he probably hadn't eaten.

After her briefing with Yoshi-taicho, and thank the heavens, her team mate for this mission she made a dash for her house and made up a bento with the miso her mother had made for dinner. She also passed by the Ichiraku ramen shop and got a take out container of her favourite, before returning to HQ.

After a single knock on the door, she poped her head through to see Kakashi with his head pillowed on his massive amount of to-do paper work. He looked up at her with sleepy eyes. Hanare placed the two containers on the desk, away from the even larger stack of finished papers and stroked Kakashi's hair until he settled back into his nap.

She used every drop of her will power not to kiss him right then and there. He was so cute and sweet on that desk. Hanare felt a wave of warmth go through her. He deserved some rest after working non stop all day and he looked too exhausted to disturb. So, sticking a note to the bags, she savoured the sight of him once more. Ok one more pat. Maybe a slight caress down his cheek. Another stroke. And she teleported to the gates where her partner was waiting.

Kakashi's rumbling stomach to the smell of food woke him up. He was dreaming about Hanare cooking dinner for him at his apartment in an apron. _Just_ an apron. She kept dropping her spoon and had to bend over in every imaginable position to pick it up.

When he spotted the bags at the edge of the desk, he had to do a double take. No, she brought food for him, she hadn't made it in his kitchen and especially not nude.

He tore the note attached to one of the bags.

_Had a good nap? This is Miso with rice and over there - is my favourite ramen. Enjoy your lunch and dinner or dinner and breakfast depending on when you wake up. See ya in a few days._

_Hana ^.^_

"She'll be a good wife" Kakashi thought opening the polystyrene ramen bowl, then sighed, "I hope I can get a good wife." He smiled and dug in.

...

By the start of the third week, Hanare finally had a whole day to herself. It was more due to the fact that the higher ups in ANBU had called her to the Hokage's office the day before and offered her the position of Captain of the Intelligence Division. She wouldn't actually assume the position for a number of months, but they needed to confirm a next leader and inform her not to do anything stupid like say, _Die_ until she could officially take up the post.

Kakashi had been there, in the Kage's office when she got the 'good' news. His face like everyone else's was trained on hers until she accepted the position. Only when Hanare had taken her first step out of the building did the terror set in. She was going to be the head of the Intel division. What the hell...

She couldn't handle that, she could barely organise her wardrobe, let alone all known information that Konoha possessed. She would have to commission members to missions. If they died, it would be her fault. She could hardly keep herself alive, how was she going to make sure others did as well. Then kakashi, still suited in ANBU mask and white cloak was leaning, with one foot propped up against the building to her left.

Great, now he would have seen the pathetic expression on her face, which she knew, only grew more pathetic with his presence. She dragged her feet closer to him, dodging between hasty passers-by.

She groaned miserably, knocking her forehead on the building.

"You'll be ok." He comforted, not moving from his position.

She just groaned louder as if that was the key to make him understand the ball of emotions knotting inside her.

"I miss talking to you again." Kakashi said smoothly.

"Hm?" Hanare's head unattached itself from the concrete.

Kakashi shrugged, "I'll see if I can meet up with you sometime. See you."

"Hmmm" Hanare sighed lightly before Kakashi poofed away.

She chuckled to herself, if a bit half-heartedly. It was nice to know she could have a conversation with Kakashi without actually using any words.

The day after that, Hanare found herself at the memorial stone. She wasn't too sure how she ended up there, it just kind of happened. She guessed her feet had led her there, hoping to find kakashi and have a full on rant about being division captain. It was probably pathetic complaining to _THE captain_ about being a little division captain. But,Hell, it was Kakashi and she needed to complain.

She couldn't tell anyone really and hadn't found any way to tell her family yet. It all seemed too surreal. She needed to adjust to it first and then tell them.

A while later, he did indeed appear. Hanging upside down from the branch above Hanare's head so that their faces were level.

"Yo." Kakashi greeted cheerfully.

"Done with your work?''

"No," he replied.

"Figures. But I understand." Her shoulders slumped.

"What are you doing here?" Kakashi back flipped down, landing infront of her.

"Thinking. I need to explode and don't have anyone to explode to. Sora is out on a mission."

"Can you explode tomorrow? I'm sorry, but Ibiki is waiting for me."

"And why is that news?" Hana picked a tiny purple flower growing in the shade of the giant tree to twirl between her fingers.

"I'm later than usual and Ibiki is in the room filled with torture instruments."

"Go on, I don't want him disembowelling you." Hanare added a small smile, turning her frustrations onto the flower.

"Alright," He dropped down to sit infront of her. "10 minutes and then you have to make me go."

"I just... I am really honoured to be given the position, I just, it's like, I might screw up the whole organisation. I don't know if I can handle it." She cupped her face in both hands.

"If I can have a somewhat hold on it, so can you. Sandaime-sama really believes in you, and Yoshi-san too; put me on the list while you're at it." Kakashi snatched the flower from her to prevent her from ripping it into strings.

"Isn't that like..." she thought about her words carefully, "Like favouritism or something? We're, you know, pretty good friends. Half of ANBU knows that by the last six times messengers found us together. People will think you gave me the job on a whim."

Kakashi sighed and held up his index finger, "Shodaime, the first Hokage was brother to the second Hokage, Nidaime." His second finger went up. "Then we have the Third Hokage, Sandaime, who was the favourite student of the Second." Up went the third finger, followed by the fourth. "Yondaime, The forth was student of the Third's Student and in all honesty, it was supposed to be one of the Third's students. Only, one went crazy, the other left the village and Jiraiya has his reasons. This village runs on favouritism."

Hanare stared intently on his curled in thumb, the pieces in her head clicking together until the epiphany hit her hard. "Kakashi! You're a thumb!"

"Eh?"

Hanare's eyes widened, "You! You're _THE_ thumb!"

"Sure, anyway Hana, I could have only recommended it, the Third had the final say." Kakashi sounded amused, "And I only recommended it after Yoshi told me to."

"Thanks for all the faith in me" she said sarcastically.

"I can never win with yo-"

"You win all the time" Hanare mumbled.

"If I didn't think you could handle it, I would have declined your review." Kakashi was being his sweet, patient self. "I do believe in you."

Hanare glanced at him gratefully before going in again, "The only reason I was considered is because Inoichi-sensei refused." And then remembering, "AND Ikaru Yamanaka got killed last year."

"Think of it as self confirmation, You're the first person in three generations to hold the position that hasn't been a Yamanaka."

"I was trained by one, but that doesn't make me as good as one." She retorted.

"You're just fishing for compliments now." His eye narrowed on her.

She narrowed her own eyes right back. "Humour me." she challenged.

"You're as good as any Yamanaka I've ever seen, and once you master that jutsu of yours you will be even better. Though, I think I'll have to make it mandatory for any one in their clan who can handle it to learn your version."

"It's not even my version, it was a jutsu I started to learn back when I was in the Johame Village. I dont think anyone who could use it is still alive." She admitted.

"Ya, Jiraiya-sensei said so." Kakashi nodded his head.

"Really?"

"He's been around. He knows a little about everything I guess. So he recognised the technique once you explained it."

"There, that to. I didn't even master it on my own. It's the Key's jutsu, perfected by Jiraiya-sama, learnt by you, and before I could even do it."

Kakashi huffed, his eye brows slightly raised. "Do you trust me?"

"It varies." A smile breaking out on her face.

"When my conviction has returned in your eyes, trust me to make a sound decision. And...do your best." he almost sounded cordial.

"You make it sound easy." Hanare protested though she was completely convinced.

"Oh, it's not." Kakashi confirmed tersely.

"I can't wait for Sora to get back." She tried to force the malice into her voice but she knew her expression gave her away.

"Ouch."

"Don't you have to be going?" Hanare more stated playfully than asked.

"Ouch again." Kakashi grasped his chest, smirking.

"I think you may be having a heart attack, you should get that looked at."

"Just the pangs of rejection." He presented her with the half mauled flower, "Thank you for the food by the way."

"Did you get the Onigiri? I left it on the desk by your papers but you weren't around and I couldn't stay 'cuz I had to give up my mission report."

"I did and it was delectable." Kakashi was using his charm on full power, marking her with that glorious exposed eye of his, "I really enjoyed the miso from the time before too, you're quite a remarkable cook."

"Ah actually...thanks." She blushed, not wanting to tell him that her mother had made that one.

"Anyway, you should get going." Kakashi raised himself up.

"Me?"

"Yeah, Yoshi asked me to tell you he wanted to see you about two hours ago." He cupped the back of his head with his hand. "Later" and then he jumped backwards and disappeared into the trees.

* * *

That was the last time their paths crossed that week. But today was the day.

Today she was going to do it. Really she was. She spent night after night contemplating it. She had to tell him. The worst that could happen would be that he wouldn't feel the same. Then she would still have THAT to deal with. If not, then she would have to find a way around THAT. God she hoped he liked her too. She was willing to settle for mild interest in her. Anything.

She searched everywhere for Kakashi. He was no where to be found. She prayed he would be at ANBU headquarters.

Hanare was tasked with committing almost every piece of information Konoha had to memory. Such was one of the impossible responsibilities of a department captain. That meant weeks of nothing but reading and learning and memorising. If it wasn't for her cranial infiltration jutsu, it would have been impossible to remember anything. She spent most of the time simply organising information in her mind, than actually understanding what she was reading.

That was when she felt something wet bump into her leg. She lurched backwards on her chair, kicking whatever it was away from her. Then Hanare heard the whimper.

"Oh MY GOD! PAKKUN!" she scooped the little dog up from under the desk. "ohmygod, ohmygod, ohmygod, I kicked a puppy! I'm soooo sorry, are you ok?!, ohgod..."

Pakkun shook his head and did a perfect impersonation of Kakashi's unimpressed stare. The little dog spat the flower he had in his mouth out at her. "Why did I agree to this?" He whined in his gruff voice.

"Ammm, Pakkun?"

"Kakashi sent that for you, said yer wouldn't be feeling good and he can't make it to see you."

With one hand still cradling Pakkun she reached down and gingerly picked up the flower from the floor.

A tiger lily.

"Pukkun, can I ask you something?" Hanare said guardedly.

"Yah, just put me down, this is embarrassing enough as it is."

Hanare let the pug go on the desk and wondered out loud. "...why did he send this flower for me?"

"I told ya already, he said he couldn't make it to see you."

"OK...but..does he usually send flowers or anything like this to people? Or girls more specifically?"

"Naw, never happened before."

Hanare turned pink at his answer and considered her next question before blurting it out in a breathless rush.

"DoesKakashilikeme?"

"I guess so." He answered in utter casualness, scratching behind his ear.

Hanare's head was spinning and she couldn't remember if she was breathing at this small confirmation.

"So he LIKES me, like really LIKES me?" she stressed the words so that the dog might understand.

With a flash of realisation the canine whipped his head a far to the left as his little neck would allow, "He never actually said those words to me."

"But you think he does?" Hana prompted timidly.

"ermmm, I shouldn't say. He does strange things from time to time."

Hanare visibly wilted, dropping heavily onto her chair.

"Wait, do _you_ like kakashi?"

"...Does it matter?" Hanare looked as if her will for living was waving goodbye to her from a high speed bus.

After a moment Pakkun huffed decidedly, "That day you were at the old training place, by the rocks" he started like he regretted saying anything already "I smelt more hormones coming off of boss than when he was a teenager."

Hanare contemplated that, did that mean Kakashi was attracted to her? She asked the little dog what it meant.

He did the doggie equivalent of a shrug, "If I smell that much pheromones coming off a dog, _it means something_."

"That doesn't really help me, Pakkun."

"Oh well, wana feel my paw?" He presented his up turned front leg to her.

Hanare poked at his little pink pads a few times before telling him thanks for the flower and for the talk. It was actually fun. They had the texture of jello and were as smoother than silk.

She studied the orange and brown spotted flower. It was beautiful with the tips slowly fading into a purple auburn and the stigma topped with buds of the same colour. She stuck in into her hair, before she could realise it was probably still wet with slimy dog drool, and went back to her studying.

Tomorrow would be the day.

Definitely it would be. She was running out of time.

* * *

Yoshi-taicho was either feeling sympathy or malevolence towards his replacement when he directed her to the prison a few days later. On the bright side, no mindless swallowing of information today, on the down side, it was prison.

Hanare roped Sora into going with her and together they spent the first rainless day in forever learning about the Konoha prison's inner workings. They had both gone back and forth to the little island situated inside a _freaking volcano_ before on ANBU business, but those visits took minutes, this one lasted an entire day. Even in ANBU gear, some of the more raucous inmates couldn't help but whistle and give snide remarks to the two women.

They couldn't get out of there fast enough. After the long run over the mountains Hana and Sora dangled their legs over the first Hokage's head. He seemed to be the only one without spiky hair that would allow such dangling.

Hanare was catching up Sora on the biggest problem of her life she had yet to encounter. It had nothing to do with the sect of the organisation of lethal ninja she would soon be given rein over and everything to do with the wolf mask wearing man that was making his way up the scaffolding stairs to their very position.

She felt her nerves buzzing and on impulse opened her mouth as kakashi reached the top stair, "Hey, _senpai_, where are you going?"

"To prison." He answered merrily.

"We just got back from there." Sora waved him over.

He walked over and took his seat next to Hanare. "Hanare, Sora" He dipped his masked face in greeting. "What were doing there?"

"Yoshi-" Hanare started but Kakashi cut her off.

"No need, I can guess."

That made Sora and Hanare laugh.

"What about you?" Hanare questioned tensely. Oh hell, if Sora didn't stop poking her in the thigh she would push her best friend off the mountain.

"Need to get a prisoner to agree to join one of our teams to take out some rouges, if they agree we'll cut their life sentence in half." Kakashi drawled.

"Who's that?" Sora asked.

"You probably won't know her. She has been incarcerated since before you were born."

"Cool." Hanare said with mock optimism.

"The village is nice from up here." Kakashi remarked.

"You'd never think it was a place where they train assassins and spies." Sora gestured to the three of them with her eyes.

"It's so peaceful with the glistening rooftops and shining river snaking its way through the village, and soon the gentle hum of cicadas will start to welcome the warm night." Hanare quoted a line from _The Samurai's Garden._

"That book was awesome." Sora said immediately catching on. "If I ever have time, I want to re-read it."

"It sounds nice if you've never actually heard a cicada." Kakashi said with his voice saturated in theatrical disgust. "Maddening little things."

"It supposed to be romantic." Hanare chided.

"How are bugs that can make such loud, irritating noises romantic?"

"It was romantic in the book." Sora defended.

"Do you two compare every situation in your lives to fiction?"

"Yeah"

"Pretty much"

"Well." He got up dusting off his pants, "I'm in a losing battle, I should get to jail before it gets dark anyway."

Sora made a 'Do it' face and all but threw Hanare towards their Captain.

"Kakashi"

"Hmm?" he turned to face her.

"I...ah, have to talk to you about something." Hanare confessed, "Well not now, but soon. When are you free?"

Kakashi answered immediately, "Day after tomorrow, we can catch up on your training."

Hanare shifted uncomfortably, "Hmmm." That was cutting it way too close.

Kakashi eyed her suspiciously but only for a moment and then turned, holding up his hand in farewell. Sora appeared behind her, putting an arm around Hanare's shoulders.

"You are scrrrewed." She announced.

"I know." Hanare hung her head, feeling her soul being sucked out.

"Let's get dinner." Sora offered, "We didn't go out together in a long time, we'll conference over food."

Hanare grumbled and let her team mate lead the way.

* * *

"I don't have a choice unless I come up with an excuse in the next two hours" Hanare shrugged into the knee length sundress.

"Ya you do! A pretty damn good excuse to. Why didn't you tell her about Kakashi?" Sora gaped at her with incredulity from her bed.

"I don't know why! I just couldn't..."

"I can't believe you." Sora was as frustrated as her bestfriend, "Maybe you don't like Kakashi that much after all."

"I DO, I...I...love...him." Hanare choked out, "But, you know my mother, I couldn't just tell her no because there's this guy that sort of kinda maybe likes me too."

"Yes you can, well not in those exact words, but you have to Hana." Sora encouraged.

"I tried to. Even Daisuke tried to." Hanare threw herself backwards onto Sora's bed, "It's because of this stupid promotion, it has my mom paranoid."

"It's not paranoia if she's actually right about it." Sora pointed out.

"I can't do this." Hanare pushed a pillow ontop of her face, trying to suffocate herself.

"Hunnie, go and talk to him and then you can kill yourself when he rejects you."

"You're a horrible person. Meanie, buttheaded, buttfaced poopiehead."

"No I'm not." The gentleness coming in Sora's voice.

"Ok." Hanare jumped off the bed, "I'll go talk to him and tell him...I don't know what yet, but Yah."

"Make sure and get you're ass back here and tell me what happened, kay."

"Mmmhmmm."

* * *

Hanare watched the puffy, dark clouds rolling in as she walked to the training grounds. These were definitely not the kinds of clouds Kakashi had meant years ago, but they did fit her mood perfectly. She looked down at herself grudgingly. She looked far too girly.

A dress of all things, and strappy sandals with a small heel. She never wore this much jewellery unless she was undercover, and even then that jewellery could be used as weapons. The earrings were drop dead gorgeous though.

Drop dead. If only she could really do that now.

Slowly she approached Kakashi's back.

"Ka..kashi?" Hanare called when she was a few feet away.

"About time, I was beginning to-" he said playfully as he spun around and then his usual lazy eye stare widened in surprise. "Wooow...Ah, I mean, am, what are you wearing?"

Hanare was too upset to even blush, she wished, however, that her hair was loose, instead of pinned up behind her. Then, at least she could have used it to hide behind.

"I just came to tell you that I can't stay today so you can go if you want to." She couldn't keep the sadness from overtaking her voice. She turned and took two short steps before Kakashi's gloved hand captured her wrist.

Good, he was running after her. Hopefully he would still after she told him what was going on.

"What's wrong, Hana?" Kakashi's tone grave.

He led them to their usual spot and sat her down across from him.

Hanare hugged her legs to her chest and buried her face behind her knees before letting out a series of frustrated sounds.

"Yes." Kakashi sounded amused, "Yes, I understand completely."

Hanare hoped he would still talk to her like that after all this was over.

She took a deep breath and raised her head. They were seated so close to each other that her toes brushed lightly against the material of his pants.

"You know the Chinku company?" She asked hesitantly.

"The big trade business?"

"Yeah. Well." The pained expression settled on her face which was not wiped away when kakashi placed his hand lightly on her shoulder. Hanare swallowed hard.

"My mother." She spoke slowly trying to get the words out. "She knows the owner."

Kakashi nodded her on.

"I know the owner too. It's like a family friend. Distant family friend."

Kakashi's penetrating eye was locked on her.

"The owner...he...wants to...set me up with his son."

Kakashi's lifeless hand slipped off of Hanare's shoulder and landed heavily on the grass.

Moments passed before kakashi said, "So, that's why." He looked down at her clothes, "You're going to meet with them now...?"

Hanare couldn't find the voice to speak. She couldn't look up at Kakashi. All she could do was stare nervously at the ground.

"What about ush-uh, you always tell them no," Kakashi pleaded, "Why are you going now? You're the girl that hates being told what to do, why are you letting them do this!"

She realised kakashi was fighting with own inner thoughts. She hoped that was a good sign. Please let him like me. Please let him just say it.

"Because of the stupid promotion," Hanare finally grated out, she looked back at him with pleading eyes, "She thinks that now I'm never going to have a normal life and she thinks I'll end up hooking up with Tenzo and die tomorrow and never get married and every stupid horrible idea she could think "

This was too much for even kakashi to wrap his head around. Suddenly, he felt himself going numb and his heart refused to beat. This wasn't happening. Not his Hana. The only thing he registered was the scorching rage surging its way to the surface.

"You're just going to _marry_ him. YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW THIS BASTARD!" He shouted.

"CALM DOWN" Hanare shouted right back at him. "It's just to meet him." She shook her head furiously, "I do know him, when we were kids I knew him. Now they just want us to meet again. I AM NOT MARRYING ANYONE YOU JEALSOUS IDIOT."

Hanare's smouldering gaze slipped off Kakashi to fall to her knees then whipped back up to kakashi.

"You're Jealous." Hanare breathed in realization.

"I'm not jealous." He said in one quick rush.

The uncomfortable silence lasted long enough for their tempers to die down.

"Kakashi." Her voice small and shaky, "What should I do?"

It seemed like he needed an hour to answer anything Hanare asked.

"Do you want to go to this thing?" he spoke to her lap, not daring to make eye contact.

"Absolutely not." A smile touching her mouth. "But I need a good reason not to." She dipped her head and forced his gaze to her face.

Hanare felt the little twinges of anxiety go through her stomach. Or maybe it was hope.

"Just don't show up." Kakashi said like an annoyed child.

"That would work for today, and if I live through my mother tonight, she's just going to carry me in chains the next time around." Damn that hope was getting to her.

"Tell them that you're not interested." He stated matter-of-factly.

"_I'm not,"_ geez why couldn't he just say it, "But what's stopping my mother from doing this again next week? I need something (or someone, she added under her breath) to be my excuse and get that woman off my case for the rest of my life."

Was that a raindrop?

"Tell them you're gay." Kakashi announced.

"Kakashi." Hana fixed her captain with a stern glare.

"Would it make a difference-" he began but was cut off by the onset of the downpour.

"I need to get out of the rain, I'm sorry, this dress runs and if I ruin it Sora will murder me" Hanare jumped up and made a bee line for the trees.

Then kakashi was infront of her. Damn that man and his speed.

He reached for her hand and started to pull her in the opposite direction. Hanare's protests were drowned out by the rain beating against their eardrums.

Kakashi kept running till they shortly reached the wall of a building at the outskirts of town.

"What are you doing?!" Hanare demanded as he made a single hand signal and tapped his finger to the wall. She had one second to register kakashi walking into that solid brick wall and disappearing before she was yanked in after him.

"What is this?" she asked, completely in awe.

"A hiding place I discovered when I was a kid." Kakashi watched her take a step towards the back of the little room. It was only a few feet wide and one could reach the ceiling without extending an arm all the way up. "It was one of Minato-sensei's places. He had the entire village rigged." He pointed to the three tipped kunai sunk into the middle of the ceiling.

"Though, I remember it being alot roomier back then." Kakashi followed her to the back.

"It's dry and out of the rain."Hanare felt the goose bumps on her skin as kakashi closed the space between them.

They stood toe to toe in the dim room, the only light coming from the intangible front wall. The hum of rain was muffled and seemed a thousand miles away.

Kakashi's brain was finally catching up; he looked into his heart and examined all his thoughts and feelings. Every plan of action lead to one solution. He wasn't going to enjoy doing this, or maybe he could do it in a way he would very much enjoy it.

"She's right there. Do it you idiot! Kiss her! Don't you love her? Pull off your mask and just effing kiss her!" Kakashi's mind was verbally abusing his cowardice, "Come on you wuss, move! Get it over with! If you don't do it now then Your Hana will be in the arms of another this time tomorrow!"

His eye twitched at that last thought. There was no option now. If Hana wasn't going to back down from this then he was going to give her reason to. He would put his heart on a silver platter and present it to her.

Kakashi's hand made it half way up to his face when he suddenly he had his arms full of slightly damp kunoichi.

Time stopped.

It stopped along with his breath, his thoughts and his hand.

Hanare had lunged at him faster than his eyes could have seen and was gripping him around his torso. Her face was buried deep within his chest, so that he wasn't even allowed a glimpse of her face.

"Your heart is beating really fast." Hanare whispered softly.

His arms encircled her, pulling her small frame tightly against him. One of his hands came up to tangle in her messy dark hair as he leaned his cheek against her head.

"You always make my heart beat fast." Kakashi voice was steady and full of emotion, "...Hana, I don't want you to go. Please...Stay with me."

She nodded against his chest as the soothing wave washed her tension away, "Pinky promise."

Kakashi tightened his hold on his Hana. At this moment, she truly was His and he held on to her like that would allow him to forever hold on to the feelings he had right then.

Amazing, beautiful, wonderful, indescribably good feelings.

They waited out the storm in each other's arms. The only sounds came from the pouring rain outside; the only movement was kakashi running his hand through her damp hair, loosening its restrictions so it fell around her shoulders the way he liked.

An eternity later, Hanare took his hand and led him to the entrance of their hiding place. She fidgeted for a moment before she found herself.

"You like me." Her voice delicate to her own ears.

Kakashi nodded slowly. "And you like me."

"Since the first time I met you." She admitted quietly.

"Huh, coincidence. So have I." He squeezed lightly on her hand.

Hanare's troubled brows came together. "Chances are that I'm dreaming, or I slipped in the rain back there and got a concussion. But can you..." Her throat constricted. "Can we...maybe if you want...I want-"

Kakashi bent and pressed his masked lips to hers.

Hanare found herself staring at his closed eye. She squeezed her eyes shut, waiting to melt into the kiss. She waited for the fireworks. For her pulse to increase. She waited for her thoughts to be fogged over.

Nothing.

What did happen was her pulse dropped. She couldn't even feel her heart in her chest. She was hyper-aware of every soft breath that she took, that kakashi took. Every thread of the material on her lips. She could think perfectly clear for the first time in weeks, maybe months. It was completely surreal. Peaceful, calming, intimate.

It wasn't what she expected. Or realised what she hoped it would be like.

Kakashi gently pulled back.

He was breathing harder than usual, his eye completely focused on Hanare as if he was unable to focus on anything else.

"I wanted to do that for a long time." He smiled.

Hanare watched him uncertainly. She felt the smile on her lips, the dazed look in her eyes, but really, she didn't feel it where it mattered.

"Hang on." She wrapped her arms around him, she debated whether to pull his mask down but decided that would have to wait till he did it himself.

Pushing her body fiercely against his, Hanare wove her fingers into the silver hair at the back of his head and crashed her lips against his. He responded immediately, cupping every curve of her body with his hands and returning the pressure of the kiss. Their lips met hungrily, withdrew for just one short second before clashing again. Under his mask, she felt his lips beginning to part, and her's followed suit. Their tongues fought against the barrier keeping them apart.

There were the fireworks.

The light headedness. Her knees buckled under diminishing self control. The racing pulse that pushed her logical thoughts away. There was only kakashi. Kakashi's lips on hers, his hands on her body. Kakashi feeling good, making her feel good.

When the whimper escaped Hanare's throat, they both ended the kiss simultaneously.

Hanare's face flushed as she stared at his chest. He chuckled and put a finger under her chin to raise her head so that he could see those beautiful brown eyes. Kakashi leaned in and pressed a swift kiss to her forehead.

"Next time we do this," He stated happily, "We do it without my mask."

"I like that plan." She beamed up at her love before diving back into his arms.

...

"Maa, what did you say before about ending up with Tenzo?"

* * *

_**Hope you guys enjoyed that...**_

_**I know this was a long time coming, and even longer wait for the chapter so-**_

_**Thank you to all my very patient readers! **_

_**I'm trying to get chapter 11 out faster than this one. Wish me luck :)**_


	11. Chapter 11

"Give me a mission! PLEASE, I'll do anything, ANYTHING!" Hanare dropped to her knees in front of her commander, "Even one of _those_ special missions! PLEASE. HAVE MERCY."

"No." Kakashi didn't bother to move his attention from his book, which, to the jeopardy of the known universe, was not Icha Icha.

"PLEASE, If I stay here I will kill somebody, possibly myself!" she grasped the hem of his shirt.

"No."

"Give me all your paper work!" Hanare was desperate. "I'll do it if you say I have to do it at headquarters!"

"I did everything already," Kakashi's one eye finally slipping down to the girl at his feet, "And all missions taken care of by other members."

"Well MAKE ONE UP." Hanare shot up and grabbed him by his collar, "I DON'T CARE IF I HAVE TO HIRE A HITMAN TO GO AFTER THE DIYAMO MYSELF, I NEED TO GET OUT OF HERE!"

"You probably shouldn't say that so loud." Kakashi glanced up at the late morning sky. "It would seriously damper your assassination attempt."

"I'll take over every challenge Gai has for you, but he has to do it outside the village."

Kakashi paused for a moment considering the offer before stating, "No."

"Will you marry me then?"

"...What?"

Hanare smiled wickedly and wrapped her arms around the ANBU captain, "I don't know, I figured the only way to get away from my mother would be to elope. The life of a missing-nin couldn't be that bad, right?"

"I could warm up to the idea." Kakashi returned her hug.

Hanare's head retracted slightly so that she could see his face, "For the record, If that question has to be asked seriously, You will be the one doing the asking."

"That wasn't a serious question?" He asked in mock surprise.

"Depends on what your answer would be." Hanare raised an eyebrow at him.

"It would depend on your answer, as you have just clearly stated that I would be the one asking." Kakashi answered smoothly.

"Touché."

"Thank you."

They slipped down onto the grassy ground. They had been spending alot of time at the cenotaph recently. Not that most of it was planned; Hanare just figured the only way for Kakashi not to be late would be to go find him herself. He was at the memorial stone fifty percent of the time and all their meetings usually started and ended right there, holding onto each other.

That was a wonderful way to spend time.

Nothing between them had really changed since their confession of having feelings for each other. If anything, their conversations had gotten shorter, and meaner. Knowing that the other liked them, all filters were off. Kakashi soon realised Hanare could be even more cynical than he was. They teased each other mercilessly when they spoke. The remaining time was spent handholding and caressing and kissing.

Much to Hanare's grief, Kakashi still hadn't taken off his mask to kiss her.

It had only been two weeks; she decided that patience was the answer. It would happen eventually. It took them the two weeks to just get accustomed to the heavier kinds of touching.

The day after their confession, they met up in training ground 1. Hanare's heart sank a little that day. Kakashi merely greeted her with a smile and directed her to start with the training. It was disastrous. Hanare could barely concentrate when Kakashi was there on a normal basis. How was she supposed to open the gates when she spent all her brain power trying to convince herself that their kiss the day before had actually happened?

She lied when Kakashi asked her if she felt any progress. She couldn't just say "No. And by the way, did I bare my heart and soul to you yesterday or was I dreaming?"

When kakashi asked her if she was feeling sick from the training, she only had to partially lie about that one.

Sick? Yes. From the training? No.

He made her sit next to him and breathe slowly till she felt better. She was sure she wouldn't.

Both Kakashi and Hanare were sitting crossed legged under the shady trees, leaning their weight on their palms. Hanare also noticed that her hand was a rather small inch or two away from his fingers. She decided to go for it. For her sanity's sake.

Her hand slowly crept towards his; all the while her heart slowly crept up to her throat. She hovered her palm over his hand for what seemed like forever. She gave Kakashi enough time to sense her hand and move away if that was what he wanted.

Was that what he wanted? Maybe after their kiss and their confessions, he had changed his mind. Maybe this was his way of letting her down. Yesterday he couldn't keep his arms off her, couldn't help but draw her as close to him as humanly possible and he held her so tightly and so long it felt like he would never let go.

Maybe he was just acting in the moment. A moment of weakness that he had never meant to happen. It was all due to her cursed wannabe engagement. It was all the buzz of emotions she had going through her. It had fed Kakashi's actions and nothing else.

Her hand dropped heavily onto his.

One heartbeat.

Two heartbeats.

Three.

Four...

He wasn't moving away. He stayed in his exact position, his nose buried in his beloved book. He didn't flinch, he didn't jerk back.

Five hearbeats...

Six .

Seven.

His hand shifted under hers.

Hanare felt her eyes begin to sting when she quickly withdrew her lightly shaking hand. Only it didn't get back very far.

Kakashi snatched her fingers in his mid-motion and gave a forceful tug. Hanare jolted forward and crashed into his shoulder, her eyes managed to open in astonishment. Kakashi laid his orange book on his lap and with his now free hand dug around in his kunai pouch till he retrieved a simple white book, bordered in olive.

"I think you'll like this." He stated simply, offering her the book.

"Tales of a Gutsy Ninja." Hanare read, faintly breathless.

"Sensei gave it to me. And Jiraiya gave it to him. One day I'll give it to Sensei's son I guess." Kakashi's eye crinkled in an embarrassed smile.

Hanare flipped through the pages till she reached the back cover, "Jiraiya-sama wrote this!?"

"Yah, it's not like his recent stuff though." Kakashi's tone was off, "It wasn't a big hit when it came out, but it's really good, I promise."

"Hm," Hanare was staring intently on the photo on the back."You know, Jiraiya-sama wasn't all that bad looking back then."

"Errr, okay." Kakashi said uncomfortably, "Take care of it, It's author's edition and there aren't many copies around. I got this about ten years ago. Ah, actually it's because of this book that I got hooked on Jiraiya's writing."

"So, basically. You're saying that your sensei, the fourth Hokage, Legendary Minato "the yellow flash" Namikaze, is the source of your obsession with reading porn in public?"

"Yes."

"You didn't even bother to defend it, you agree its porn?" Hanare was incredulous.

"No." Kakashi went on ardently, "It quality writing, it has its...adult moments, but that's what happens in real life. It just makes the story more captivating."

"If that's what you want to call it, fine. Whatever makes you sleep better at night." Hanare then realised that their fingers were still laced together.

"It does actually, Icha Icha makes a superb bedtime story."

"Do you know how much more Kunai you would be able to carry if you didn't have a library in your hip pouch at all times?"

Hanare's face was warming. The physical contact was all she needed to confirm, without a doubt, that this man was hers. He wanted her as much as she wanted him. And the small gesture made it difficult to breathe.

Kakashi noticed her flushed cheeks immediately and squeezed her hand, "I was hoping for a 'hello kakashi kiss' this morning. Do you mind if I get an 'after training, but hopefully my Hana will go out for dinner with me later kiss?'"

Hanare laughed at herself for being so paranoid and jumped him. Literally _jumped on top of him_ and pressed her lips against the material covering his.

"Honestly, you don't have to be so cryptic," Hanare shook her head at him once they were vertical again, "If you want to talk to me, just talk to me. If you wanted to tell me you liked me, you just had to tell me and if you want to kiss, by all means, kiss me."

And so he did.

* * *

A couple blissful days later, Yoshi-taicho, bent on making Hanare's life as difficult as possible, commissioned her to run around the village at the crack of dawn, as an ANBU messenger because most others had been sent out on missions. Hanare crushed the smile on her face as soon as she saw where her second memo of the day was going. The Leader of ANBU himself, Hatake kakashi – codename- Wolf.

Some God up there was certainly pleased with her. It was about damn time too.

Kakashi wasn't at the memorial stone, so his apartment it was. In true ANBU style, Hanare perched herself on his window sill, waiting for him to sense her and open it. He had a really nice view from there. It was mostly of other buildings but the sunrise from his window would be amazing. She was probably only a few minutes late too. The morning sun was just above the horizon bathing everything in a cool orange.

Five minutes went by and no kakashi. Hanare felt his chakra signature right there on the other side of the curtains. She slid the window open and peeked inside. Kakashi was asleep, sprawled directly below her, clutching his pillow to his chest. He was wearing a dark blue vest and his mask was on. Geez, the guy even wore his mask to sleep. He twitched when Hanare landed gracefully next to the bed.

"Kaaaakaaaashi..." Hanare sang.

He grunted and buried his face into the soft pillow.

"Come on sunshine," Hanare poked him on his bare shoulder. "Time to wake up."

Kakashi's both eyes cracked open at once and he hurled his pillow at the masked person in his bedroom.

"KAKASHI!" Hanare yelled at him from the desk across the room she was pushed into.

The ANBU leader rolled off the bed and dragged his feet to Hanare. She only had time to register that he merely had on a pair of green boxers with paw prints on them, when he clumsily extended his neck and leaned his nose up to Hanare's chest, taking a deep breath. A tensely confusing moment passed before he straightened his posture. With his normal eye sleepily being held open, he tipped Hanare's tiger mask up and over her head.

Then, without warning, his arms captured her and hauled her onto the bed sheets with him. They bounced on the sinfully soft mattress till the springs settled. Kakashi wrapped one leg around her waist and held her to him with an iron grip. Obviously, she had replaced his pillow as his cheek nuzzled into hers before blissfully settling into the squishiest portion of her face.

For some reason, illogical and incomprehensible to Hanare, she started to struggle out of his arms. She protested loudly and squirmed with all her might but she didn't even budge him.

"mmmm" Kakashi groaned huskily, and put a finger to his lips and went, "Shhhhh."

That was all it took to convince Hanare. A low chuckle escaped the back of her throat.

She slid her arm over Kakashi's slivery skin and slowly stroked his warm arm. He sighed contentedly and settled back to sleep.

Hanare traced nonsense patters along any exposed flesh she could reach. His skin was too smooth and soft to belong to a feared shinobi such as the copy-ninja. If it wasn't for the evident well-built muscle directly beneath and occasional scar Hanare's fingers would hitch on, she would question if the man in her arms was really her Kakashi. It seemed as if every moment she spent with Kakashi was her new favourite memory. This one by far was the best...until probably the next time they were together.

The blush rose up her face thinking of what the next time would be. She was already in bed with the man, if only serving as a furnishing, did that mean the next step would be...

Ok, time to think about something else.

Hanare would have fainted from the temperature of her own imagination along with the gentle body heat coming off of the Jonin she was cuddling with. If she was lucky enough to go to Heaven, this would be what Heaven smelt like. The entire apartment reeked of Kakashi-ness, maybe the faint touch of dog that his family house had too. The bed had a concentrated dose of his smell. That wonderful warmth of trees and his soap, all brought together with the spice of his own natural scent. Hanare inhaled deeply, placing her only free hand on the copy-nin's muscled back to draw him even more tightly to her.

She imagined that if having Kakashi curled around her while she was wearing full ANBU armour could feel so unbelievably amazing, what would it feel like if she was in pajamas or perhaps even less?

The little twinge of arousal coursed through her and converged right between her legs. If his blanket hadn't bunched up between them, she was sure there would have been a certain morning occurrence of the male body being pressed into her thigh.

Kakashi was already heavy on top of her but now his weight had reached to bone crushing proportions. She glanced at the curtains; the light seeping through was already a great deal brighter than she remembered. Belatedly she decided that it was time to wake Kakashi up.

Hanare rubbed his back and softly called his name. He mumbled something unintelligible so Hanare tried to roll him off of her. She managed to pull her cheek out from under his, only to have his head fall onto her chest. His arm wrapped around her while the other brushed along her stomach.

"Kakashi." Hanare's voice was gentle but a bit impatient.

"...You're...comfy" He sighed, half asleep. His hand trailed upwards, passed lazily over her left breast and flattened over her heart.

The goosebumps rose on her skin and she felt that all too familiar flutter in her stomach. Hanare leafed her fingers through his pale locks and pushed them back so she could place a lingering kiss on his forehead.

"You're such a baby." She whispered.

He angled his head upwards to look at her. He was so childlike and peaceful. Still slightly under that innocent harmony of sleep.

"But you're a very cute baby." Hanare finished, placing her palm under his jawline.

Kakashi slowly climbed up her body and kissed her sweetly on the lips. She felt him move his frame to align it with hers and then shift most of his weight onto his arms at either side of his Hana. Their kiss went on...and on...and...on.

Gently, softly, ever so tenderly pressing their lips against each other for what seemed hours, pulling back a fraction for seconds and then meeting again. Their warm, moist breath tickled between their faces, adding to the delicate passion. Unknown to either of them, their hands slid together, fingers lacing. Kakashi's hips slightly pressed down on her, causing a Hanare shaped impression on the mattress.

An indiscernible length of time later, Hanare nipped at his covered lower lip when their kiss ended, or rather paused. She was thinking she got a new favourite memory when kakashi spoke up.

"I like waking up to you." Kakashi's low slumber induced voice sent chills through Hanare.

"I like waking you up." She captured a fistful of hair and directed him back down for another soothing kiss.

They were both slightly panting by the time kakashi regained enough brain function to ask, "I'm not against it or anything; I'm actually hoping it happens again. But why were you here so early?"

"Oh right." Hanare would have slapped herself if kakashi wasn't securely holding onto both her hands. She tried to reclaim them but Kakashi wouldn't let go. Hanare made a "Hmmp" sound and braced one leg against the mattress before flipping them over. She was vaguely aware that the only reason that had worked was because kakashi had let her man handle him. He was also looking a touch too pleased seeing Hanare straddling him.

"Pervert." Hanare commented reaching into her vest pocket and bringing out the squashed scroll.

"I'm not a pervert if you're enjoying it too." He combated.

Hanare waved the scroll infront of him, "Yes, Taicho, I'm just having a bawl. Now time to be a big boy and go to work." She said in the driest tone possible.

Kakashi took the scroll and tossed it onto the nightstand. "That was supposed to land on the floor." He mumbled.

He shrugged and ran his warm hands along the inside of Hanare's thighs. She startled and her legs tightened around his torso on reflex. "I don't want to go to work right now. I don't want responsibilities; I don't even want to be a ninja right now. Can't we just be us for a little while? Just Kakashi and Hanare. Not Copy Ninja, not Tigress. Just Kakashi and Hanare."

"Kakashi and Hanare." She said the names like if they were sacred, like if she mispronounced a single letter they would break and vanish for all eternity.

Kakashi crooked his head slightly to the side at her tone.

She grinned widely at him, "It still surprises me sometimes that all of this is real." Hanare stroked the bridge of her nose, "That you could really like me and somehow all this worked out."

Kakashi took her fingers in his and kissed the back of her hand. "That happens to me as well, but It's real, and I do and it did."

Hanare let herself fall onto his chest and buried her nose to the side of his deliciously smelling neck. She sighed, mostly out of happiness, partly because she was still in her ANBU uniform and her mind had started to wonder what they would end up doing if she _wasn't_ in her uniform. She wouldn't mind that happening, but the nagging bit of a conscience that had survived through the hundreds of people she had lied to, manipulated, or just flat out killed tugged at her. She wanted it to happen really badly, the rebellious teenager in her got the amusement out of the fact that she would basically be sleeping with her boss-hang on-boss-ANBU-Messages that needed to be delivered.

She sighed again against his neck, "I'm going to get into sooo much tr-"

"Oy, Kakashi!" A gruff voice came through the closed wooden door.

"What day is today?" Kakashi asked wearily, as Hana raised her upper body off of him.

"Thursday."

"KAKASHI. Get up!" The bedroom door was no longer closed. An enormous black dog pushed it open and was padding into the room with Pakkun riding on its head.

"Uhhh." Pakkun gazed at the sight of Kakashi, mask, vest and boxers, flat on the bed with his hands clasped on the legs at either side of him. The rest of Hanare was still seated on top of the Jonin who commanded them.

The large dog looked equally as stunned and turned, practically charging out the door. There was an after thought "Sorry" being called back. Kakashi and Hanare looked at the door still swinging on its hinges.

"I should teach them how to knock." Kakashi nodded to himself.

Hanare lept off him and sat back on her heels. "What just happened?!"

"Thursday is training day with my nin-kin." Kakashi finally decided to sit up, "It's my sleep late, till they come and find me day."

"Kakashi! They probably think we were...you know...were...uh" Hanare's train of thought hit a brick wall.

"It's not like they don't do it." Kakashi was as blunt as ever.

"But-and...uh" She made a frustrated sound.

Kakashi chuckled and pecked her on the lips, "I'll introduce you to the rest of the team, you can clarify whatever you want with them."

He swung his legs over the bed and stood up. Hanare whipped her fuzzy head to the side and locked her eyes to the headboard.

There was the photo of Kakashi's genin team. How didn't she notice that before? Hanare was absolutely fascinated by the framed picture. Kakashi was there, exactly like he was the first day she had met him. Slender, little, he had that unimpressed look to him which was amusing coming from a 10 year old, a cloud of silver hair above him. Obito had his arms crossed and aimed a peeved look sideways at Kakashi. The fourth Hokage stood in the background, each hand on the head of his two male students. Rin in the middle, an excited smile spread across her face.

She felt Kakashi's skeptical eyes on her and she perked her head in his direction, only to look away again.

"Kakashi...pants?" Hanare suggested.

"Sure, sure." Kakashi apologised adorably, "Sorry."

Hanare examined the picture more closely until Kakashi's hand appeared at the corner of her eye.

"Ready?" He was still in his vest and mask, but now his standard Jonin training pants were covering him from waist to ankle.

Hanare's eyes flickered from Genin Kakashi to ANBU commander Kakashi, "You didn't change that much." She accepted the offered hand and let Kakashi usher her to the door.

"Nor did you." He poked a finger to her cheek teasingly, "You just lost some chubby-ness."

Eight heads raised as they stepped through the door. Hanare recognised the one with the sunglasses on the couch as Akino, there was a red furred canine beside him, on the arm chair lay a silver dog with a crown of spiky hair that Hanare couldn't help but compare to kakashi. In the middle of the floor sat the enormous black dog from before and a little blond was curled up next to it. By the bathroom door? Hanare guessed, was a bloodhound that had bandages wrapped up its neck and face. Then Pakkun's head was sticking out of the kitchen along with two light brown faces, one of which had the Kanji symbol for love on its forehead. She guessed that was Ai kakashi had mentioned before.

"That was fast." The little blond mutt mumbled, receiving a resounding snicker from the remaining seven canines.

Hanare's eyes shocked open and the colour rose to her cheeks.

"We weren't doing anything." She ground out, staring at the floor.

The blood hound turned towards Pakkun, "Looks like Kakashi finally lost _IT_, eh?"

Hanare turned towards Kakashi just in time to see the scowl turn into a bored stare.

"Give me the scrolls you have to deliver." Kakashi held his palm out.

Hanare dug into her vest pocket and handed him three flattened messages. He read the top of each one before throwing it at three respective dogs. Hanare noticed that he threw a scroll rather roughly at the bloodhound.

"Hanare this is Bull, Urushi, Shiba, Guruko, Uhei, Biscuit, and you met Akino and the little devil already." He pointed at each one, finally waving affectionately in Pakkun's general direction.

"Uhei that goes to the Aburame clan, just ask for Ban, Guruko take that to the lizard masked woman we were on that mission with, you should remember her scent and Shiba go to Yagura-san, though he's probably at HQ by now."

"Kakashi?" Hanare's voice uncertain, "Are you sure that's ok? I was supposed to do it."

He gave her a look that clearly said, "I am the commander and I can do whatever I want." Hanare firmly ignored it and narrowed her eyes at him.

"Fine," He walked over to his desk and scribbled a note, "Take this to Yoshi-san in under two minutes." He tossed the folded paper to the dog he said was named Urushi.

The four dogs disappeared simultaneously in four small puffs of smoke.

"For the rest of the day, I have personally allocated you to an assignment, and you are not to be bothered," Kakashi stated.

Hanare was ecstatic.

"What are the chances that Yoshi-san knows that we..." he glanced measuredly between the both of them, "that I didn't actually give you an assignment?"

Hanare didn't even have to think about that to answer, "He'll be about 100% certain of it by tomorrow morning."

Kakashi hung his head in the midst of his rear but certainly present stupidity. The girl beside him laughed and hooked her arm in his. She glanced at the four ninkin who were blatantly staring at them.

"So who else didn't eat breakfast yet?" she asked happily.

The combined effort of Kakashi and Hanare allowed breakfast for eight dogs and two humans to be prepared in record time. There were whispered teasing throughout the morning, causing Hanare to light up like a Christmas bulb and then promptly tell the dogs off. Her explosive behaviour lasted till Ai came into the kitchen, where Hanare was dropping a load of bowls into the sink, and told her not to bother with the boys. If _That_ had really happened, they would be able to smell it for miles.

With that noted, she accompanied Kakashi and the ninkin to the border of the village. While they executed intricate formations and attack styles on the most pitiable chewed up training dummy Hanare had ever seen, she practised opening the first gate. She wondered for a moment where the design of just being just Kakashi and Hanare for the day had gone. Oh well, ninja would always be ninja no matter how hard you to tried to ignore it.

She almost got it. The gate opened and for a full two seconds she felt the rush of chakra to her systems. The buzz of power was unlike anything she ever felt in her life. Hanare was sure she could outrun her tigresses in that state. Then black...

When she came too, Kakashi had her balanced across his lap. He had a hand pressing her to his chest and his lips were pressed into her dark hair. On her lap Pakkun was curled up and snoring softly. She looked around and found the rest of his battered ninkin laying on the ground, in all states of exhaustion.

"Ohiyo." That wonderful voice said.

Hanare smiled at the copy-nin, even he looked tired.

She slowly leaned in to kiss his masked lips, "It's nice waking up to you too." Her voice was grated and low, but full of love.

"We should defiantly try it out some more." Kakashi suggested and pulled Hanare towards him so that her head rested on his cheek.

Pakkun growled in his sleep at the movement.

"It's safe to say that if ninja doesn't work out for me, I'll always have a career as a pillow." Hanare patted the little pug on her lap.

"I would be your best customer."

"I hope you mean that you would be my ONLY customer." She said pointedly, "I'm a pillow not a prostitute. Get your facts right, Hatake."

Kakashi chuckled as Hanare waited for his depraved comment about her use of the term prostitute.

It didn't come.

* * *

Hanare had a choice.

Either spend countless hours memorising seemingly useless stacks of information at HQ or spend the day at home with her mother who would, no doubt drag her out kicking and screaming, to somewhere she didn't want to go or make her do house chores all day and end up being kicked and screamed at for not doing it properly in the first place.

She chose neither.

Hanare ended up at the training grounds taking in the sight of team Gai. Kakashi hadn't been kidding when he said Gai's student reminded him of himself. The kid had the same too shiny bowl cut, same wide eyebrows, same green jumpsuit and orange leg warmers. Hanare was certain that the legwarmers were not needed. Gai used his to conceal his million pound weights he wore at all times; surely his student wouldn't be wearing those until he was atleast a Chunin.

Gai scrutinized his three pupils as they beat out the identical kata on three training posts before him. They weren't half bad. The girl was putting her weight on the wrong section of her foot and the mini-Gai was putting too much force into his strikes. The other boy with the long hair was almost perfect, if lacking a bit of fluidity in his movements, but that would be fixed with experience.

The long haired boy missed a beat and turned to face Hanare with those unmistakable eyes. Well that explained the Genin's natural aptness, he was a Hyyuga.

Hanare held one hand up in greeting as she approached the team. "Hello Gai-san, your team is quite impressive." She always found the way to easily gain the acceptance of children was to compliment them.

"Ah!" Gai flashed her a smile that seemed to *ping* "Thank you! My dedicated, hard working students and I appreciate the recognition of their youthful accomplishments!"

A bubble of laughter escaped Hanare's lips. How could anyone manage to speak like that all the time?

"Let me introduce you to my fiery pupils!" Gai declared, "This is Lee, TenTen and Neji, and this is the renowned Tigress of Konoha! TenTen! You should aim to be as strong and celebrated as her. Isn't she just bursting with the springtime beauty and vigour all Konoichi should want to emulate!?"

The little Konoichi with her hair tied in two tight buns at the top of her head cast an exasperated glance at her sensei then looked at Hanare with slight reverence.

"Um, Gai?" Hanare took up Kakashi's monotone, "Next time, just introduce me as Hanare okay."

"Yes, Hanare! Whatever you prefer." He had a slight blush on his face.

Hanare smiled warmly at him, she told him of her progress on opening the gates as quickly as she could so that his students could get back to their training. She noticed mini-Gai...ermmm...Lee's face perk up as she talked. He watched her with a sort of thrill and had a fist clutched to his side in excitement the entire time. Gai gave him a knowing look and directed his students back to their training.

He was actually a pretty good teacher. Hanare hid her surprise at the fact and followed Gai's instructions as he micromanaged every aspect of Hanare's form. While kakashi gave out textbook explanations and would randomly share tips when the situation arose, Gai did the exact opposite. He went into every possible detail of the technique; he corrected her posture a fraction and even told her the best way to _breathe_ to accomplish her goal. _BREATHE..._

Hana would have rolled her eyes at his theatrical behaviour if it hadn't worked. And boy did it work. She opened the first gate and it stayed open! She didn't even faint! All the power, the energy sizzled inside her. She had to do something with it!

Pushing off the ground, Hanare did a double layout gaining atleast three times as much height as she normally could. She landed effortlessly, an accomplished laugh ringing out into the clear sky. No wonder Gai was so disturbingly energetic all the time.

The spandex wearing Jonin regarded her proudly with his hands propped on his hips. Hanare's stunt had attracted the attention of his genin and they too watched her intently. Suddenly, Hanare found the perfect way to test out her new strength.

"Gai-san!" Hanare's voice sounded all too eager to belong to a spy, "Spar with me!"

He started to tremble with anticipation and he opened his mouth, obviously wanting to scream something to the heavens, when something like realisation hit him over the head.

"Oh, Hanare-san! Your hot blooded eagerness touches me!" Was Gai tearing up? "But you should not push yourself the first time having the gates open, you don't know the amount of youthful energy you now possess!"

She thought about it for second before her eyes fell onto his students. Alright, now she had to do it. She was supposed to be a kunoichi that others looked up to, as Gai had stated. She wasn't about to let a chance to show off slip through her fingers.

"Come on Gai-san! Just a little _challenge_!" she goaded him, "I won't push it too far."

Hook, line and sinker.

"My students please pay attention!" Gai called, "Hanare-chan has gained blazing success today at opening the Kaimon! She will now demonstrate the abilities it has given her!" The corners of his lips perked up even further, "I will not be opening any gate for this match."

Hanare's mouth dropped in an amused, if slightly unpredicted smile. Gai was able to smack talk before a spar? This was going to be good.

"Your move." Hanare glared at him.

He gave her a thumbs up and crouched into a fighting stance. Gai's weight was on his left leg and his right was stationed to the front, one palm extended stiffly at the lead. One, two...Hanare counted two weak spots. Not that it mattered, the next second there was a green blur and she narrowly dodged an impossibly strong leg from shattering her collar bone.

Forget everything she had ever said about Kakashi-speed, Gai-speed was inhumanly greater.

"You're NOT using the gates!?" Hanare called over incredulous.

Gai laughed in his haughty, over the top fashion.

Hanare closed the distance between them in the space between her heart beats and knocked his feet out from under him. Gai twisted so that her kick impacted with the ground. Hanare only just registered that it had made a small crater when she dodged Gai's fist. She landed on her palms and used the momentum to spring into the air and plummet back down pushing her weight onto the man.

She managed to knock the air from his lungs and land a blow before he recovered. There was a rapid exchange of fists and feet, hits and misses faster than the Genin could keep track of. It stayed at that level for a long time. Hanare was moving so fast the world seemed to slow around her. Gai had to make an actual effort not to get injured. She even returned a few of his trademark whirlwind kicks. More and more craters were appearing on the earth and a tree had a splintering gash along its bark.

Gai's lip popped out when he realised two of his students were cheering for his opponent. That was the opening Hanare needed, she redid the double layout and both her boots made contact with the spandex covering his steel-like chest. Gai went flying to the edge of the clearing but managed to right himself and skidded to a stop.

Hanare was beginning to pant heavily; the tijutsu master was only just starting to pant at all. There was a sharp electric stab to the back of her neck and she realised the Gate had closed.

"Gai?" She said uncertainly rubbing at the piercing sensation that spread down her back. Her limbs were starting to feel unnaturally heavy. She dropped to her knees before she keeled over.

"Oh shoot." Was the last thing Hanare heard before it all went dark.

* * *

There was an annoying beeping coming from somewhere in the dark room. She had to make a mental note to kill Daisuke or the thing he was toying with so early in the morning. Was it morning already? She couldn't remember going to bed. Why was she so hungry and why did her room smell like disinfectant? She sniffed again, finding it hard to open her eyes. There was the scent of Trees and flowers and spice, and soap and...

"Kakashi?" Hanare's voice was low.

"Ah, you're up." He moved from his position at the window to the chair at Hanare's side.

The hospital room was dark, the only light was a beam of silvery moonlight sheeting through the windows. It complimented Kakashi's...well kakashi-ness perfectly. It was cold even under her starched blankets and her mind was painfully clear of her surroundings.

"Why did you bring me to the hospital?" She coughed clearing her throat, "I've fainted before from opening the gate, you're just going to get in trouble with my mother when she finds out."

"I sent your brother a note saying you're on ANBU business." Kakashi ran the back of his knuckles along her cheek. "I wasn't sure if you wanted your family worrying."

Hanare watched him with a puzzled expression. "But Daisuke isn't in the village, he's on a mission for the next day or two."

"You've been sleeping for about 24 hours." Kakashi smiled down at her shocked face. "Gai feels pretty bad for not stopping your fight, he brought you that." Kakashi jerked his head to the side.

There was a flowery topiary in the shape of a smiley face. It was just corney enough to make Hanare smile. She also just realised she had a roommate. A middle aged woman was feigning sleep in the bed across from Hanare. She was probably a chunin judging from her poor acting skills. Hanare mentally shrugged, she might as well give the woman something to look at.

"Tell him thanks for me." She reached up and threaded her fingers with his.

"Tell him yourself, he's coming back tomorrow."

Hanare yawned, "I still feel sleepy."

Kakashi bent down to the side of the bed and stroked her long hair back.

"Chakra exhaustion and muscle fatigue." He stated, "You're getting too much like me."

"It was worth it." Her tired voice filled with wonder, "Oh, tell Gai he can give himself a point, he got me to open the gate and you didn't."

"Super, now you're sounding like him." Kakashi commented despairingly.

Hanare giggled and they fell into a comfortable silence. Kakashi's gloved fingers combing through her hair, soothing her to sleep.

Right before she succumbed to her tiredness Hanare said just above a whisper, "Kakashi?"

"Hmmm?"

"How brave are you?" her voice dreamily soft.

He thought for a moment but answered before she could completely doze off "Why do you ask?"

Hanare gave a small yawn, "Mommy has alot of friends who work here. You should tell her I'm here before she finds out herself."

Kakashi preferred to face down an army of rogue ninja than have to face the wrath Hanare told him her mother could have.

"I'll get right on that." He whispered soothingly, "Now rest."

* * *

_**You all with those comments making me blush...**_

_**I finally worked the title in, and yes I actually had it planned from the beginning, I just didn't realise how much I would have come up with before I got to this point. **_

_**Please review and tell me if you all liked.**_

_**Arigato ^.^**_


	12. Chapter 12

Something was wrong.

Very, very wrong...

Hanare tried to wrap her head around it. What was it? This was not how things were supposed to go. Not at all. Everything Hanare had believed in since her birth...proven wrong.

A genjutsu? No she tried to dispel it multiple times and nothing had happened.

The unsettling feeling deep in her stomach, her dizzying head, her constricting throat. She didn't sense anything, everything was normal. Well. Not normal. Far from it. Very, very as far from normal as normal could get.

She watched them from silted eyes, there had to be something. Something amiss, some clue or sign that this was not real.

Kakashi turned towards her, the only visible part of his face perturbed. He had caught on to her chakra levels. With Hanare's duffle bag slung across his chest he crossed the hospital room and stopped directly infront of the brown eyed woman.

He was clearly suppressing an eye roll when he asked, "How are you feeling?"

"Disturbed." Hanare scrunched up her face at him and the revolting sight she had been witnessing for the last two days. The other person Hanare had been observing chose to exit the room then.

"If you keep blowing your chakra reserves, you'll end up right back here." Kakashi chided softly.

"Something has to be wrong," Hanare concluded, "This. Is. Not. Possible."

Kakashi groaned at that one, "Why do you believe that it's more likely that you're under some sort of forbidden jutsu than it is to believe that I get along with your mother?"

Hanare made a noise like she had just stepped in dog poop. "EXACTLY! I spend my entire life believing, no KNOWING that no matter who I like, she would NOT like, and then THIS. I have been banking on her not liking you to know that your right for me, now I dont know what to think anymore, WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU!? Something has to be wrong with you."

"Do I need to order a psych evaluation?" Kakashi's eye creased in a smile, "I can take you off the mission roster if you're not up to it."

"SHUT UP!" Hanare yelled.

Kakashi just laughed and pulled her off the bed, "Come on, I'm walking the two of you home."

"I can walk myself home." She growled. "I'm a ninja, damnit."

"Ummhmm." Kakashi sighed and caught her arm pulling her to catch up with her departed mother, "This is going to be a long walk."

* * *

Days passed with nothing to do. Hanare was bored to tears, literally. She was staring at parchment that needed to be memorised for so long that she needed to be reminded that blinking was important. As Hanare complained, the more you know, the more shit you had to deal with.

Kakashi interrupted her most days with an early lunch break that would end up lasting till mid evening. On one particular day, Hanare had been seated on the S-shaped couch in the ANBU library with her legs hooked onto one of Kakashi's, who was pressed up next to her.

She was tearing up with laughter as Kakashi told her of the story of how he and Gai had defeated this pair of Ninja from the stone country who were definitely _too_ close. They would finish each other sentences and then there were the odd looks and touches and disturbing references between them. And they had this ridiculous hand shake they would do after every stupid quip they said. A fist bump followed by the most obnoxiously loud slap of hands he could imagine. It was so bad it had even annoyed _Maito Gai._

Just before the exploding tags Kakashi had rigged went off in their faces, he and Gai had done it for no other reason than to piss them off. Years later, it had stuck and they continued to use it when they agreed upon something. They were dreadfully aware that it made them just as creepy as those to enemy nin, well, Kakashi at least was.

Hanare's laughter was bouncing off the library walls when Inoichi Yamanaka and Tenzo walked in on them. Kakashi and Hanare scrambled for their ANBU masks that had been discarded hours ago until they realised who it was.

"Inoichi-sensei!" Hanare called despairingly, "Don't tell me they gave you a mission, geez, I've been begging for one for weeks and I don't get anything."

"You have important things to do here. Don't take your responsibilities for granted, Hanare." He was on full sensei mode.

"Hai, hai Sensei." She waved him off. Her attention was then attracted to Kakashi and Tenzo who were leering each other with knowing expressions. Oh damn, Hanare needed to diffuse the situation. Oh damn again, sensei noticed them too.

"Uh, Tenzo-kun. Kakashi-uh-san-sempai-ah has been teaching me how to open the first chakra gate. I did it! I perfected my jutsu!"

That didn't faze them though. Inoichi joined Tenzo in glaring at Kakashi. It was only due to Kakashi being able to hold his own against two pairs of eyes with only one of his own, that he wasn't ripped to shreds with all the daggers being aimed at him.

"Sensei?" Hanare made a last ditch effort. "Tenzo-kun?"

All three men snapped out of it at the same time.

"That's wonderful news Hanare-chan," Tenzo commented, "I am happy for you."

Inoichi lowered his head, making his blond pony-tail bob into the air, "We're all proud of Hana, thank you Kakashi-san for teaching her, she failed to mention that you were the one helping her though."

"Must have slipped my mind," Hanare didn't bother to put much effort into the lie, she knew that her sensei knew and her sensei knew that she knew she never had a prayer of getting anything past him at this point. What a shame to, she could have concocted a wonderful, intricate lie and even worked Gai in on it since he _was_ the one who really finished her training. "So, off on ANBU business, are you sensei?"

After a few seconds of no doubt putting everything together perfectly, he responded, "No, you know I retired from ANBU years ago. Just picking up some files for the Interrogation department."

"Oh, Inoichi-sama" Tenzo spoke up, "Once in ANBU, always in ANBU. You never really leave do you?"

"I guess you're right." He began directing the other man to the back shelves, "But I'm far too old for missions now." He gave a short wave to Hanare before walking off.

Hanare shot Kakashi a distressed look, to which he just shrugged in response.

"Leave. Now." She whispered fiercely.

Kakashi allowed himself to be dragged out of HQ by Hanare and teleported back to his apartment.

"I think you're on Inoichi's hit list now." Hanare told kakashi as she slumped down on his couch.

"Getting brash are we?" He said amused, "Or did you forget to add the 'sensei' after his name."

"You call him Inoichi." Hanare shrugged.

"Well I did fight in a war alongside him when I was a brash little kid." Kakashi said conversationally, "Plus, he isn't my sensei."

"Kakashi, seriously. He knowwws."

"And?"

"And, I don't know, it's weird." She scooted over to cuddle against his side.

"Boys were a forbidden topic with sensei. His daughter owes our team big time for softening him up. He was insanely strict before us. And now he knows about us being...us" What were they anyway? Together? Yes. Boyfriend and girlfriend sounded like an insult to the deep feelings they possessed for the other. Lovers sounded too provocative for them. They still hadn't gotten passed kissing with a mask over his face yet.

"What was up with you and Tenzo anyway?" Hanare nudged him.

He shrugged, "Usual."

"I've never had two guys fight over me." She laughed.

"Why?" Kakashi set his jaw, "Do you want two men?"

Hanare perked one corner of her mouth and jumped into his lap, "One is plenty trouble, thank you." She laced her fingers around his neck and drew him to her.

"You're mine." Kakashi mumbled against her lips. His voice was low and silky, making her tremble.

"Oh, I know." She drew back in an attempt to stop shaking, "There were the longing looks you gave me on every mission we've been on, and then the night you tricked me into bed with you and making up excuses to see me, psssh, if you say we're gona train together as your alibi then make sure some actual training took place. And this," she fished out Kakashi's family pendant from her shirt and held it up to the light, "this was a dead giveaway."

"You know, we never did get to have that match."

"Cuz you would win and either way, I'm keeping it." Hanare stated.

"It never occurred to me that I would ever take it back anyway." Kakashi looked at her in that tender, heat melting way only he could.

Hanare felt her face flush and she cupped his cheek with her hand.

"Smart man." She whispered, and traced the line where cloth met skin with her thumb,then pressed her cheek against his. She sighed contentedly against the softness of his face, the strands of his silver hair that tickled her nose. The sensation of Kakashi's strong hands slowly stroking her back. Hanare could feel his breaths hitting her neck and almost hear the seductive drum of his heart through layers of clothing.

"Do you want to go to the waterfall?" Kakashu hummed against her ear suddenly.

"Hmmm?"

"The waterfall I told you about." Kakashi gently guided her off him so that he could see her face, "The one I went to with my Sensei."

"Sure, when do you want to go?" she grinned widely at him.

"Ah, now?"

"Now!?" she raised her voice with incredulity.

"Why not?" Kakashi apparently thought that the ANBU leader and future captain of the ANBU Intelligence division leaving the village together, without any prior notice was a perfectly sane idea. Add in what Inoichi sensei had just said about their responsibilities in the village and it became wonderfully_ illogical_.

Hanare opted for an intense stare instead of words.

"Honestly, no one would miss us for a day or two."

"I can think of a small army of people who would miss us. The Hokage, Yoshi-taicho, the mailman, the-" She retorted pointedly.

"I'll them it's some sort of assignment." Kakashi drawled.

"You abuse your position far too much." She said matter-of-factly and flicked him on the forehead.

"And you will too."

"Kakashi, no, we can't." She tried to break the blindly obvious conclusion gently.

"Yes we can."

"Absoultely not."

"Yes."

"No."

"Yes."

"Oh, shut up." Hanare pouted as she met up with Kakashi a few yards behind the Hokage monument.

Kakashi simply continued to walk with the smug grin on his face. His thoughts on Hanare and another he couldn't help but compare her to. She was wearing her standard Konoha uniform this time. The way her vest fit over her short sleeved, navy shirt and the way her richly coloured hair was tied back, with a few long locks spilling over the Konoha Headband at her forehead, framing her face perfectly. Hanare's knee high boots were different than her shinobi sandals but that was minor. And Hanare's gloves were different, whereas she didn't wear gloves, but also, minor details. Hanare was unknowingly, yet almost exactly like-

"Hey, do you remember Kushina-onichan?" Kakashi asked over his shoulder.

Hanare had to think for a moment before she placed the name, not accustomed to hearing 'onichan' associated with it. "Minato-sama's wife?"

"Yeah."

"Ah, vaguely." She shrugged, "Long red hair, really pretty, I heard she was a fearless Konoichi. Why?"

"Mh, No reason."

They walked in silence for a few minutes before Hanare remembered she was supposed to be annoyed with Kakashi and not using all her brain power on figuring out why he had brought up Lady Kushina.

"We better be back by tomorrow!" She called threateningly.

"Hmm."

"Kakashi!"

"Emmm?"

"Your an Idiot." She pouted.

"Ah, keen observation." He said in pseudo-impressed voice.

"I will murder you one day and make it look like someone else did it." Hana half threatened.

"You won't have to search too far for a scapegoat." He remarked flatly.

That struck Hanare. Sure she knew it; she was probably on more than a few enemies' radars herself. But still. Hearing Kakashi say it out loud was...unnerving. It made her heart seize up unexpectedly. Ninja were accustomed to risking their lives. They did it on a daily basis. But Hanare hadn't thought of what it would be like to actually lose Kakashi.

It didn't seem like a possibility. If one of them were to die first, it would be her. She hadn't expected this feeling of utter...loss... to strike her. Hanare realised it was probably selfish to think like that, that she would be the first to go and therefore she need not think of what others would feel like. It was a candid risk being an elite of the village. That was probably why she took for granted Kakashi's skills and abilities. He had so many of them and had survived so much in his short life that well...

She hadn't even realised she stopped walking and kakashi was already a few paces ahead when he turned and called her.

"Just... be careful ok." Her voice was small but heavy with emotion.

Kakashi studied her a moment before marching back and wrapping his strong arms around her.

"Get that look off your face. I'm not going anywhere." Kakashi's voice was gentle and comforting. Hanare sunk into his arms as it soothed her.

"You have to pinky promise." Her muffled voice said. There was sadness in it, apprehension, maybe even a little belief and joy.

Kakashi's hand found hers at the side of their embracing bodies and he hooked his finger with hers before squeezing her hand.

She took a deep breath before making her mind up. She tried to force the indifference into her voice as she asked, "What exactly would you call us? I mean, I know we're together but, what would you label us?" she tacked that last part on hurriedly.

Kakashi actually laughed and patted her head, "I believe they call it dating."

Hanare's eyes trailed away and she bit her lip. Considering...

"Hana." Kakashi said softly, "I never planned to get involved with anyone; actually I fought myself for the better part of the last few months because of it. But, I couldn't keep myself away from you."

"I never would have thought I would be capable of caring for someone this much and especially not being shown the same back. But I do. " He continued smoothly. "I'm not asking you move in with me or anything, though I don't have any objections either," He tapped his chin thoughtfully, "but given my life, our lives, I figured it's all or nothing, and you should know, can't live with the prospect of nothing. I'll always come back to you. I'm not making that mistake again."

Hanare smiled.

"You're not allowed to die, ok."

"I assume I will at some point, maybe around my 70th or 80th birthday would be nice." Kakashi went back to his usual drawl.

"Fine, but I go first." Hanare said dramatically. Hm, maybe thinking like that wasn't all bad.

"Sure, Sure." He shrugged, "I'm looking forward to seeing you for the last time, all old and wrinkly too, exactly one minute before I turn 70 or 80."

Hanare shook her head, "I always knew you had odd taste, but is that really what you want for a birthday present at that age?"

"It has a certain appeal to it."

"Just remember, you asked for it."

* * *

The LOK waterfall was the very definition of magnificent, beautiful and secluded. All things Hanare mentally checked off her list of what she had expected. A deep pool at the base, leading off to a single crystal clear stream, surrounded by the greenest, most vibrant foliage Hanare had ever seen. Vines curled up and across the larger trees making a canopy that shaded the area, making the light that shone through dance and glimmer. Bushes of brilliantly coloured flowers and berries and at the top of the falls, the slick boulders forming a natural platform.

Hanare was about to eat her words and ask if they could stay longer, when Kakashi did something she never thought would ever happen in all her years.

He shrugged out of his Jonin vest and tugged his shirt over his head, baring a very sculpted, very attractive and no doubt very rock solid torso. Hanare actually felt her heart stop when he toed off his sandals and stepped out of his long pants. Finally, off came his hitai-ate, leaving him in only his mask and a pair of blue swimming trunks which ended right above his knees.

Her hanging jaw retracted with distinct clank of teeth right before kakashi turned to her and and said, "Come on." He dove off the edge of the cliff with perfect form and disappeared beneath the clam waters with a silent splash.

Hanare had to take a moment to compose herself... Alright, moment over.

Nearly tearing her own clothes off, she was infinitely grateful she had the insight to put on a pair of shorts before her long pants, and dove in after kakashi.

The water was freezing and she thread water waiting for her body to adjust. What the hell was wrong with Kakashi? Just diving head first into this liquid glacier. Speaking of which, Kakashi hadn't surfaced yet, which meant only one thing. Well, maybe he had drowned, but not likely.

Hanare suppressed the groan when she felt a hand wrap around her ankle and had already taken a deep, bracing breath when said hand pulled her completely into the water.

The better part of the day was spent at half formed attempts at drowning each other. It was rather inciting being brushed up against the ridges of the copy-nins chest over and over. Having him grab her bare legs beneath the surface and pull her around him.

An hour or two was devoted to playing with Kakashi's pack and Hanare's tigresses. It was about time they met each other, as they might have to fight alongside each other at some point. To Kakashi's relief Ami and Suki had no intentions of eating any of his furry little companions. A few of the dogs even took a liking to riding atop Ami's back when she gracefully glided through the water. With only one incident of Suki and Bull growling at each other over an apparently unfair contest of who could knock down a tree the fastest, everything went well and soon after, with Kakashi and Hanare alone once more, they continued to drown each other.

* * *

When both were panting like they had sprinted to Suna and back, Kakashi picked her up and leapt straight onto a thick branch of the nearest tree. She tried not to act too surprised by kakashi jumping three stories into the air with her in his arms.

Hanare hugged her elbows, "It's even colder than the water. Carry me back down." She held the back of her hand out to him regally.

"I don't know," Kakashi smirked with quite possibly the dirtiest look that had ever graced his covered face, running his eyes up and down her dripping body, her drenched clothes sticking to every inch of her, "It has a nice view from here."

She made the motion of slapping him on his cheek but ducked her head at the last moment, pressing a soft, sweet kiss on the side of his face. "I'm outright disappointed in myself for actually feeling flattered by that." She shook her head. "I really must love you."

Huh.

Why did that sound so odd?

No, not odd.

Just... anti-climactic maybe?

Like those words carried the weight of the world and yet they had slipped passed her lips so easily, so naturally. Like she had been saying it to Kakashi all her life. Given what kakashi had just said, not a mere four hours ago, it shouldn't have been such a gargantuan surprise. Sure it was the first time those words, in that specific order had been said between them, but really? After everything they'd been through, after their _long_ history, kakashi still felt the need to look so utterly stunned by those three words. Well, technically five words.

She quirked her mouth and felt her cheeks warm in embarrassment. And the stupid man was still there...shocked silent. Seriously, he was supposed to be the genius here, _obviously_ she was in love with him. She felt the need to yell "DUHHHHH" and really slap him this time to make sure he was conscious. Instead she lunged.

Wrapping her still wet body around his. Hanare was willing to bet he only caught her and hugged her tightly in his arms on pure habit alone. Minutes seemed to pass before he stammered out a "Ah-I-I love-you...too."

Hanare's shoulders drooped and she shot him a peeved look before brushing her lips against his mask. He moaned a deep, tremulous sound low in his throat as he picked up the kiss. Hanare mumbled "idiot" against the fabric, knowing that her lips would be swollen with the level of force their mouths were meeting with. That's when she felt it dig into her thigh; to be honest her leg had, at some point, found its way in-between Kakashi's.

Was it _supposed_ to be THAT hard?

It didn't seem possible a human body part could be that rigid...and big. Something had to be anatomically wrong with one of them because that could not ever, and she meant NEVER fit _there_.

Her knees buckled under her and Kakashi held her tighter, supporting her, pressing her even more provocatively against him and his...state. She cleared her throat and motioned with her eyes downward. When kakashi's eyes widened, she had enough giddiness by that point to chuckle at his predicament. His eyes slid back onto her and his single opened eye was filled with an expressing not even Hanare could decipher. It made her melt. It made her worry. It made her heart jump and then sputter out completely. Kakashi's head moved in one, short, resolute nod; more to himself than Hanare.

He reached his toned arms to her sides and slid his hands into hers. A moment passed where their eyes locked, he watched her thoughtfully, hesitantly. Hanare squeezed his palms, letting a small reassuring smile touch her lips. Whatever Kakashi was battling himself with, Hanare wanted to support him and help him through it.

In one slow, graceful action, Kakashi drew her hands up and rested them between his cheek and his warm palms. Only, when he shakily hooked her fingers into the material covering his face did Hanare understand. She watched with bated breath and ever oh so slowly did he move her fingers down, dragging the mask with it. Kakashi's gaze studying her, taking in even the smallest change and reaction of her features. Hanare felt the smooth glide of her fingertips against his bare cheek, her pulse franticly expanding up her chest, spreading to her shaking arms and inebriated mind.

She was being pulled towards him without actually moving. Her face mere inches from his. The heaviness of the situation was tangible and crushed her lungs. As the dark cloth slipped completely off his nose and reached the precipice of his lips, her eyes fluttered closed...

...The paper thin softness of supple lips brushed hers.

Kakashi gasped against her mouth, producing a small whimper to erupt from the back of Hanare's throat. She could hardly feel her quivering hands, but they remained adamantly on the silky smooth skin of the copy-ninja's jaw. Her eyes refusing to open even when his arms encircled her, pulling Hanare flush against him. The calm wind biting into her wet skin, making her impossibly chilly; and for once kakashi too, was freezing. Where she was standing on his toes, his hands, even his chest and abdomen were as cold as marble.

Kakashi continued to press gentle, fleeting kisses to her lips as if accustoming himself to the feeling. The feeling of kakashi's actual lips, his actual cheek under her touch was new, exciting, and felt so...right.

Hanare shivered and pulled back when his hot, moist tongue ventured out and trailed along her bottom lip. She gradually raised her head, opening her eyes, peeking through her lashes and she _saw_ him.

A shy smile playing on those blush lips, his grey eye slightly guarded, yet hopeful. That strong jaw and ethereal skin. The way his features complimented each other, finally all visible on his completely naked face. The only imperfection was the silvery scar bisecting his left eyelid. And that, in itself could scarcely be called an imperfection. It was uniquely Kakashi and only added to his being. Hanare caressed his skin as her fingertips reached for his left eyelid. The scar there was slightly raised and even smoother than his already sinfully tender skin.

She took her time trailing her hands over every inch of his face. Taking the utmost care and precaution to relish every moment, committing every nanosecond of it to memory. It was like finally being able to reach for something that was forbidden all her life. Something unattainable and precious. The thing she had sought after without even realising how meaningful and consequential it was. Hatake Kakashi, so untouchable, reserved and unwavering, allowing her past the walls and letting her see him, as he was. It was without a doubt, the emotional side, the trust and comfort associated with the action than it was the physical gesture.

Hanare realised Kakashi was patiently, or rather, impatiently waiting for her to respond. What could she say at such a momentous time? She had to find some way to convey the onslaught of emotions coursing through her. Where to begin? She clearly had to reassure Kakashi after her silence and lack of response.

She took a deep breath, letting it out slowly before her lips parted in a brilliant smile, the perfect plan of action surfacing.

"Eh." She shrugged feigning indifference, tilting her head to the side and stroking his cheekbones slowly with her thumb. The impish grin on her face.

She felt the breath Kakashi had been holding let loose and whisper over her face as he relaxed. A smile so sweet and divine grew on his lips. Both of his eyes curving upwards by the motion. So that's what the rest of him looked like when he smiles.

"Hmm, dimples, huh?" Hanare's feather light touch migrated to the corners of his upturned lips, just there, where matching indentations accentuated his expression. And what an expression it was. Hanare was sure every female and perhaps some males, in the village and of every village in the world would be reduced to a shivering puddle of goo by that expression alone. And it was HERS ALONE. All for her, no one else and almost certainly no one's before and if she had anything to say about it, no one's ever again.

"Ah, do you," Kakashi bit his lip, "do you like dimples?"

Her stomach was threatening to take flight with the quantity of butterflies fluttering about. There were Kakashi's lips, his lips forming those words and Hanare couldn't help but be overwhelmed by his self-consciousness; he obviously had no idea how gorgeous he was. His silky voice, that faultless body and a face so handsome, not a warrior's face, not a killer, not a torturer, more close to angelic purity than any of those, coupled with that edge that was signature Hatake Kakashi. Everything Kakashi did had a certain edge to it. He was like a walking temptation.

Instead of answering, she stood on her tip toes and placed lingering kisses on each dimple before capturing his lips. It was like her years of romantic tension being released in one delicious, sensual kiss. Hanare was only then aware that she was tasting him for the first time. A low giggle bubbled up to her lips and against Kakashi's. She pulled away just long enough to affectionately nuzzle the side of her nose against his and tell him in a very breathy and excited tone,

"New best memory ever."

* * *

Hanare hit the sleeping bag more roughly than she had expected, a silver haired, mask-less Copy ninja wickedly smiling inches above her. Through the adrenaline and rapid heart beats, she managed to reach up and kiss his waiting lips.

The very second they had set up camp in a near-by cave; she had been smothered in affection by Kakashi. Essentially, the setting up process involved much more affection than she ever recalled. Just entering the tiny cave gave Kakashi an opportunity to push her up against the wall and attack the sensitive skin of her throat. That led to Hanare escaping and slamming him non too gently against the very wall and giving him the hickey of his lifetime. Kissing, biting, ass-grabbing and some steamy glances later, she finally ended up on her back.

Kakashi was working on her in a way that made her head grow hazy. Trailing kisses from her lips to her cheek, down her neck, nipping at the hollow of her collar bones. She arched against him with every lick, Kakashi's strong hands finding purchase on her hips and slipping under her shirt and inching upwards, clutching at her silken skin with every movement of her hips.

One hand wove into his fair damp locks and the other settled between the muscled elevations that were is shoulder blades. She pulled his body tighter against hers, their gasps of pleasure resonating in unison. Kakashi sped up the pace, biting hurried kisses everywhere, like a hungry, starving man, Hanare jerked and shivered under his ministrations, her shirt being tugged over her head in a fast fluid motion so it felt as if Kakashi never broke contact. Alarm bells were going off in some small, ignorable part of her

A hot tongue glided down her stomach, she whimpered at the new sensation, it was almost too much. Hanare tugged at the fluffy mass of hair, returning Kakashi up to her panting lips and the pressure of their stomachs gliding together slightly easing the tingling. She took the lead this time and explored Kakashi's sanctified mouth with her tongue. It was so warm and moist and oh so sweet. The inside of his cheeks were crisscrossed with smooth slightly raised lines, a particular area close to his lips had the lingering metallic tinge of blood. Hanare guessed Kakashi bit his cheeks often enough to leave such carnage, or he had rather sharp teeth. Probably a combination of both. Long, chiselled arms moved under her, fiddling with the clasp of her bra.. All these things would have registered in Hanare's mind if it weren't for the utterly unmistakeable hard-on pressing right _there_ between her parted legs.

His warm hands ran down the curve of her spine, ghosting around her hips and up her stomach. And kakashi kept kissing, and kissing and kissing...

His fingertips peeking below her bra...

...

"STOP."

And Kakashi froze...

Why did Hanare say that? Why did it sound like... that? What was going on? She wanted this; her damp panties were proof enough. Why did she say stop? Why...Why was Kakashi looking down on her like that? What did she look like in his eyes? Why did he look so understanding when Hanare, herself, had absolutely no insight as to what was going on with her thoughts?

A look passed over Kakashi's face. He had a rather expressive face it seemed. He smiled gently and with a small kiss on Hanare's forehead, he withdrew. She followed him up and fell into his arms, burying her face in the crook of his neck.

His hand came up and rubbed circles into her back, "I'm sorry, got carried away." Kakashi's kind voice floated down.

"No. Wait." Oh great now she sounded panicked, and why? "It's ok, I...I...want to." If it was possible after their activities, her face deepened to an even more alarming shade of blush.

She felt Kakashi's body stiffen and slowly, eventually relax. He turned his face towards her and nuzzled to the side of her face, "I love you, my Hana." He pressed a kiss to her cheek, "It's alright."

How did his voice sound so comforting and reassuring and sure, when Hanare had lost the ability to form coherent feelings?

She hadn't even thought of it but the next sentence came out of her mouth, "But, all or nothing...?" Was that even a question? She had meant to state it, but it didn't go over as one.

Kakashi tightened his hold on her, breathing deeply, taking her scent in, "Dummy. I didn't mean you had to sleep with me." He shifted her so that he looked directly into her unfathomable brown eyes, "I want you... all of you... but that doesn't mean sex is an utter necessity right now. I don't want you to look like that or sound like that when we do get to it. Alright?"

Hanare's voice was still stuck in her throat but she managed to nod her head.

"Alright." He cupped her face and kissed her so tenderly and exceedingly filled with love that she couldn't hold herself together and sagged against him.

"I don't care if we never have sex, I just want to be with you like this, for you to always be mine." Kakashi nuzzled into her hair, squeezing her against his chest.

Hanare dissolved into a low laugh, "But we should get to it eventually, right?"

"Right."

...

The next morning Hanare awoke stuffed into a single sleeping bag with the Copy-ninja himself, chastity intact. Her own sleeping bag lay undisturbed next to them. The warmth of the arms and legs twining around her own and the steady rhythm of Kakashi's heart under her head _by far_ outweighed the stiff neck and appendages that had lost circulation hours ago.

She stretched the little she could before trying to worm her way out of her copy-ninja cocoon. That is until she felt a draught and looked down, seeing her bare chest...

Kakashi awoke that morning to a throbbing hand print across his cheek and a very, very long walk back to the village.

* * *

_**I'm soooooo sorry.**_

_**This chapter just didn't want to be written...**_

_**I suddenly became very busy and when I actually set aside time to write, I would get the most abominable writer's block EVER.**_

_**In short, I'm sorry, Life sucks, I'll try harder/ faster next time. ^./**_

_**Pinky promise. **_


End file.
